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Data breach

Personal data of 168 presidential aircraft passengers, including president and spouse, leaked

First reported · Last reported · 133 related reports

Personal information, including passport numbers, of 168 passengers on board the presidential aircraft, Air Force One, including the president, the president’s spouse and cabinet members, was posted on VirusTotal and exposed for approximately five months. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs took steps to remove the posted information and reissue passports for all passengers, and completed the reissuance of passports for the president and spouse. Police launched a formal investigation and are examining how the leak occurred, including the possibility that the ministry’s contracted security monitoring provider uploaded an email attachment to an external scanning site.

Key facts

Affected organisation
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Incident type
Data breach
Occurred / detected
Not confirmed
Scale of damage
Personal information of 168 passengers on board Air Force One, including the president and spouse
Cause / method
Exposure caused by the posting of a passenger list file on VirusTotal; the exact circumstances of the upload remain under investigation
Location
South Korea

If your data was exposed

  1. Don’t tap links in texts, calls or emails that mention this incident and offer compensation, refunds or breach checks. Check directly on the organisation’s official website or app.
  2. If you’ve suffered harm, report it. Call 118 (no area code) for privacy violations, contact the police for financial losses, and apply for dispute mediation to seek compensation.Personal Information Infringement Report Centre ↗Korean National Police Agency cybercrime report ↗Personal Information Dispute Mediation Committee ↗

Timeline

  1. It emerged that the personal information of 168 passengers on board Air Force One had been exposed online for approximately five months.
  2. Police opened a formal investigation, while the Ministry of Foreign Affairs proceeded with removing the information and reissuing passports, completing reissuance for the president and spouse.
  3. Police formally registered a case against an unidentified suspect in connection with the personal data leak and stepped up the investigation.
  4. An investigation examined the possibility that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ contracted security monitoring provider uploaded a list contained in an email to VirusTotal.
  5. It was confirmed that the contracted security monitoring provider suspected of being the source of the leak also performed security work for other government agencies.

133 related reports

The summary and key facts are written by AI from related reports and may contain errors. Check the original articles and the organisation’s official statements for accurate details.