Pentagon Shuts Down Systems After Cyberattack

Last week, Pentagon officials said that an attacker penetrated the unclassified systems in the Office of the Secretary of Defense prompting authorities to take as many 1,500 accounts offline

Elements of the OSD unclassified e-mail system were taken offline yesterday afternoon due to a detected penetration. A variety of precautionary measures are being taken. We expect the system to be online again very soon. "Pentagon said"

Between 1,000 and 1,500 users of the system were taken offline, a defence official said. On Wednesday, a congressional panel disclosed that hackers also have succeeded in penetrating computers at the Department of Homeland Security, the lead government agency in providing security against cyber attack.

The Pentagon would not comment on the source or the nature of the attack, only saying that they detected it and that they caught it early enough to stop it. The systems were used for basic non-classified email transmissions so no critical or sensitive information was accessed.