Over one month ago adult affair website Ashley Madison was broken into by hackers. The hackers threatened to release details of some 32 million users including names and email addresses unless the site was closed down immediately. Recently, the hackers made good on this threat. The website who’s slogan is “Life is short. Have an affair” is marketed to facilitate extramarital affairs. In other words, it is a dating site for married men and women who wish to cheat on their husband or wife.
Earlier this week the Associated Press (AP) in the US released a report which was compiled after analysing the data dumped by the hackers. The report indicates that some 15,000 email addresses from government and military accounts were linked to Ashley Madison. These include those of US Attorneys, an Information Technology Administrator in the White House’s support staff, a Justice Department Investigator and a Division Chief. Other employees visited the website from networks in the Pentagon.
In an attempt to hide their identity, some employees would use non-government emails and handles such as “sexlessmarriage” and “soontobesingle”. Some would also pay for the accounts using pre-paid credit cards. However users could still be identified by their I.P. addresses as they accessed their account on office networks.
The policies regarding visiting such websites during work hours varies between agencies. The fact that these are US government employees on taxpayer time is one issue. Another is raised when considering the fact these are individuals with sensitive jobs who could be blackmailed. Individuals who used military emails to access Ashley Madison could be faced with further problems as adultery can be a criminal offence under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
The fallout from the break in of Ashley Madison is ongoing and will have far reaching effects. Recently a second data dump was released by the hackers which appears to contain emails belonging to the CEO of Ashley Madisons parent company, Avid Life Media inc, as well as internal documents.
