Biden demands answers after massive Social Security data leak · The Floridian

President Joe Biden's administration is under pressure to respond to what may be the largest public data leak in U.S. history.

An anonymous online profile called USDoD claimed to sell 2.9 billion records containing the personal information of all Americans, including names and Social Security numbers.

The U.S. Department of Defense said it obtained the sensitive information from National Public Data (NPD), a U.S. government contractor that collects and sells access to personal data.

Given that the company is headquartered in Florida, the NPD data leak caught the attention of local lawmakers.

U.S. Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) released a statement demanding answers from President Biden regarding the hacking attack and measures to protect Americans' data.

“As we learn more about this breach, the Biden-Harris administration must detail what is being done to hold the contractor that managed this data, National Public Data, accountable for its failure to protect against this hack,” Scott said.

A class action lawsuit has been filed against NPD because the company failed to properly secure and protect the confidential information it markets as part of its business model.

Scott also called on Biden to explain how the U.S. government will attempt to recover the stolen data.

“The American people also have a right to know what is being done to recover this data and how the government will protect it and ensure that a security breach of this magnitude never happens again,” Scott said.

The data breach at NPD is just one of numerous major breaches of public data this year.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), for example, is investigating nearly a thousand different breaches of health data systems.

Each breach allows hackers to access the protected health information of at least 500 or more individuals. As a result, millions of Americans have had their personal health information stolen by unknown perpetrators.