'We hacked the FBI:' Hackers say they have data on all FBI employees

spenvo 530 points 366 comments September 22, 2026
www.404media.co · View on Hacker News

https://archive.ph/96YBP

Discussion Highlights (19 comments)

dgellow

Im sorry given how bad of a situation that is, but it would be so ironic if they used Claude or codex for this

smalltorch

Thats a major attack on the US. If your systems are compromised and need to coordinate, what do you even do if you can't trust anything, assuming the attacker is still inside the network?

kelseyfrog

So they're getting access to a year's worth of free credit reporting for the inconvenience?

tencentshill

Well that's a big one. Perhaps firing expertise and hiring incompetents wasn't a good idea.

htrp

TLDR. A Peoplesoft (Oracle HR) instance was compromised which allowed movement into GovCloud (AWS)

iAMkenough

In the same week the head of the FBI went on national TV to claim credit for increasing the bureau's use of AI by 605%, whatever that's supposed to mean. https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intell...

applfanboysbgon

Wow, that is bold. I wonder if they'll get away with it because incompetent leadership has decimated the US's capabilities? This certainly doesn't bode well for the US's odds against its nation-state rivals.

TZubiri

Is their name a reference to pokemon? Or to the meme that the FBI/CIA glows through the screen?

giancarlostoro

...and this is how the FBI makes you a higher priority target, and you wind up caught.

reactordev

There’s a scene in Battlestar Galactica (2004) where someone asks Captain Adama why the Galactica doesn’t have networked computers. So the cylons can’t hack the ship…

corvad

Hmm ShinyHunters seems to be in the news quite a bit recently. Most high profile was the Canvas LMS hack last spring right during college finals. Wonder if there will be a ransom for this data as well.

corvad

Looks like it was an Oracle PeopleSoft 0-day so I imagine there are a lot more systems vulnerable.

levocardia

So, what are the odds this was done with an open-weight LLM?

KronisLV

That feels like publicly announcing that you want to be in a lot of trouble.

jgalt212

If I use Claude or OpenAI swarm to commit crimes, and the vendor knows I'm up to no good, what's their liability? Do they plan to invoke the phone company defense?

phendrenad2

Imagine the FBI's relief when the hackers only got a list of their employees, not the UFO files.

jacobgold

At this point, no one seems capable of keeping a large database safe. I assume all medical and biographical information that exists is in the hands of the major state actors. China hacked 22.1 million records of US government employees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Office_of_Personnel_Manag...

steveBK123

Claiming they got all employee & spouse data. Wondering about pets..

Ancapistani

Meh - I'll believe it when I see the actual data. Qilin allegedly hacked BATFE about a month ago, and the files were never posted to their site.

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