Report: White House staffers’ Gmail accounts breached

Three White House staffers that work on social media outreach recently had their personal Gmail accounts breached, according to NextGov.

The breached email accounts have been sending email messages to other White House social media staffers that include malicious links to what appear to be CNN and BBC articles, NextGov said, citing individuals familiar with the security breach. Once a person clicks on the link to access the news article, however, they’re directed to a fake Twitter or Gmail log-in page that prompts them to enter their username and password.

{mosads}Hackers are able to view their log-in information once staffers enter it on the bogus site.

More than a dozen current and former White House digital media aides have been targeted by the hacking operation, which was still happening as of Sunday evening, according to NextGov.

The report did not say who is behind the breach or whether any sensitive information was accessed, although it noted that White House staffers are barred from communicating about official work matters outside of their professional email accounts.

The White House and FBI declined to comment.

The breach comes a few weeks after hackers affiliated with Anonymous posted old email addresses and passwords for an email newsletter service used by congressional staffers on the Web.

The House chief administrative officer warned aides last week that information stored on the service “should be considered compromised” and predicted that more disclosures may happen.

— Justin Sink contributed