Federal Reserve unsure of data hack damage as FBI investigates

The US Federal Reserve is still unsure of the extent of the damages caused by a recent raid on its networks, according to reports.

Federal Reserve spokesman Jim Strader said law enforcement was still unsure what information was compromised during the attack, according to Reuters.

"We are in the process of a comprehensive assessment to determine what information might have been obtained in this incident," Strader is reported to have said.

"We remain confident that this incident did not affect critical operations of the Federal Reserve."

The comments come as it's been revealed the FBI is investigating the attack to try and uncover more clues as to what was taken and who was responsible.

"This incident is the subject of an active criminal investigation with the FBI and we cannot comment further," Strader said.

At the time of publishing the Federal Reserve had not responded to V3's request for comment.

The US Federal Reserve admitted that one of its internal websites was briefly hacked earlier in the week, promising no critical functions or key data had been compromised.

The admission came just as the Anonymous collective posted statements claiming the hackers had successfully stole the personal information of more than 4,000 US bank executives.

The statements contained a link to a Pastebin post purportedly included an employee's login information, credentials, IP addresses and contact information.

Trend Micro security director, Rik Ferguson told V3 it was good to see the FBI and Federal Reserve are already investigating the extent of the damage.

"It is really not unusual for an investigation of this nature to take a relatively considerable amount of time, they will be making forensic examinations of systems, trawling to log data, interviewing employees and contractors and making sure it is all done in a way that will be admissible as evidence should that be required," Ferguson told V3.

"It's great to see that victims of cybercrime understand the need to provide acceptable evidence and do not rush to jump to conclusions. That kind of reaction could leave weaknesses undiscovered and systems would remain vulnerable in future."