President Trump’s Top Security Advisers Have Had Their Passwords Hacked

Fourteen of President Elect Donald Trump’s top staff members, including incoming cyber security adviser Rudy Giuliani, have had their passwords stolen and leaked online from mass hacks that have taken place over the last few months and years.

According to a Channel 4 investigation, passwords for key members of Trump’s cabinet and some of his most senior advisers are publicly available online, just a day before his inauguration to President of the United States of America.

As well as Giuliani, Channel 4 News claims to have seen “a number of” passwords used by Lt Gen Michael Flynn, the former military intelligence officer. and Trump’s incoming national security adviser.

Data breach

In an extremely worrying start to controversial businessman Donald Trump’s presidency, those whose accounts have been affected include people who are set to take roles as: the Secretary for the Interior, the Secretary for Labour, the Director of the National Trade Council, the Chief Trade Negotiator and the Director of Oval Office operations.

The stolen passwords are believed to been caught up in some of the mass data breaches that have hit the headlines over the last 12 months or so, such as those affecting LinkedIn and social network MySpace.

Speaking to Channel 4, cyber security analyst Troy Hunt said: “Let’s say someone from Trump’s team has data leaked and it appears on a totally unrelated forum somewhere and someone takes those credentials and accesses the individual’s Gmail.

“If this is an individual in a position of power or influence they may well have discussions in their personal mail that could be compromising.

“And if they don’t then the attacker who gains access to that Gmail may then use that account to begin conversation with other people in the contact list, impersonate them, elicit information from other individuals. It then just opens up a door to a raft of much bigger problems.”

The news will undoubtedly cast a shadow of tomorrow’s ceremony and comes after former President Barack Obama called on Trump’s administration to improve internet security.

Quiz: Barack Obama and his work with technology