Hackers Try to Infiltrate White House Computers

At the start of National Cyber Security Awareness month, the White House has become the latest target of a cyberattack.

[More from Mashable: PNC Is Latest Bank Hit With Major Cyberattack]

Fox News is reporting that a series of hackers have tried to infiltrate the White House's computer system, including ones with access to nuclear information.

The effort was classified as a "spear phishing" attack, which is typically an email fraud attempt that aims to compromise confidential data. It's unknown at this time if any data was stolen, but the Associated Press said the attack was isolated to prevent spread.

[More from Mashable: Facebook Users Say Private Messages Appear Publicly [UPDATED]]

The report also noted that White House has partly confirmed that the breach was conducted by Chinese hackers.

SEE ALSO: 25% of Americans Were Victims of Security Breaches in Past Year

"This was a spear phishing attack against an unclassified network," a White House official told FoxNews.com. "These types of attacks are not infrequent and we have mitigation measures in place."

The source added that a White House Communications Agency staffer opened an email with a malicious link or attachment.

A new study conducted by National Cyber Security Alliance and security firm McAfeeOne found that one in four consumers in the U.S. had personal identification lost or stolen due to a data breach in the past year.

In addition, in the last week alone, national banks including PNC Bank, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo had reportedly fallen victim to a series of Distributed Denial of Service attacks.

A hacker group from the Middle East is said to behind the attacks, which allegedly sent large amounts of traffic ? up to 10 to 20 times the normal rates ? to the sites at once to crash the systems.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Vacclav

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hackers-try-infiltrate-white-house-computers-130632362.html

yom kippur dancing with the stars modern family george strait Lady Gaga New Girl Avalanna