Ex-SEC worker accidentally broadcasts former colleagues’ personal data

A former Securities and Exchange Commission employee inadvertently uploaded his old coworkers’ private information to another agency’s network when he switched jobs.

It is believed the former SEC employee downloaded “templates” from the SEC to help him in his new position and unknowingly downloaded the personal data in the process. “He then uploaded that sensitive information to the new agency network twice — once when he began working there in April 2012, and again in June when he could not find his original upload.”

The discovery came ten months after the breach, during an unrelated security scan. The second agency was not identified.

A July 8 letter to SEC employees, obtained by The Hill, warns that the names, birthdates and Social Security numbers of an undisclosed number of current and former employees were compromised

The SEC said the breach involved employees who worked for the agency before October 2009.