The U.S. State Department has shut down its unclassified email system for security measures, owing to a suspected attack by hackers.
On Friday, Nov. 14, the department officials revealed that they took the unclassified email system offline post the detection of suspicious activity. However, no suspicious activity was detected in the classified system.
"The department recently detected activity of concern in portions of its unclassified email system," revealed a senior department official. "There was no compromise of any of the department's classified systems."
Per an official, who chose to remain anonymous, the email system of the State Department was hacked at the same time as the White House incident that took place in October.
The official also disclosed that the maintenance has resulted in the disruption of access to certain public website and unclassified email of State employees. However, the systems are anticipated to be functional soon.
Recently, the spate of hackings which have compromised the systems of several government agencies and businesses have increased. The incidents have been blamed on Chinese or Russian hackers, but the question as to who is behind these attacks remains unanswered.
At this juncture, it is not known who is behind the attacks. However, the State Department has beefed up security measures to protect its unclassified network as well via the system shut down.
The State Department is strengthening the safety "of its main unclassified network during a scheduled outage of some Internet-linked systems."
While it is alleged that Russian or Chinese hackers are the masterminds behind the recent hackings that have affected the White House, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other government organizations, the suspects have questioned the accusations.
"We've been hearing a series of groundless allegations against Russia recently. So we can't take them seriously any longer unless there's proof," said Dmitry Peskov, presidential spokesman.
The security enhancements are anticipated to be through by either Monday or Tuesday. The State Department is expected to tackle the shut down after the upgrades.
