FBI removes contractor working with its PeopleSoft system after data breach, says report

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation has removed an Accenture contractor working on its PeopleSoft installation over their role in a data breach that exposed personal details of FBI employees, Reuters reported Monday.

This is the first time that anyone other than the hacker group Shinyhunters that claimed responsibility for the breach has linked it to PeopleSoft.

“To date, our review has determined that the incident occurred as the result of a security failure of a platform managed by a third-party organization — after a contractor failed to implement a security patch explicitly issued to secure the platform,” FBI Cyber Division Assistant Director Brett Leatherman told Reuters. “As such, the FBI has removed the contractor and taken all necessary steps to both mitigate any further risk and protect our workforce.”

Accenture was the third-party organization Leatherman would not identify, “two sources familiar with the matter” told Reuters.

As for the unnamed, unpatched platform, Reuters’ sources said that was Oracle PeopleSoft, the HR system that hacker group ShinyHunters claimed to have exploited in last month’s break-in.

This article first appeared on CSO.