OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) – Officials with the Oklahoma Employment Security Commission (OESC) were working late last night on a computer glitch that may have revealed some Oklahoman’s personal information.
A viewer talked to News 4 after she says she was attempting to check her unemployment benefits status on the OESC website, but every time she submitted her address and social security number, someone else’s information would pop up.
We called OESC officials. They told us it was a “glitch” in the system.
“Yes, it does happen on occasion,” said Patrick Allmond, former programmer and computer expert. “Usually a glitch will do some sort of data breach where it exposes information. It looks like some unencrypted information got out so hopefully whoever the software developer that is involved knows how to get on top of that asap.”
And officials say yes, they fixed the problem in a couple hours.
Allmond says with as much traffic and redesign that has happened on the site recently, its concerning but not alarming.
“It’s unfortunate but it doesn’t really scare me too much,” said Allmond.
That’s because nowadays Allmond says Social Security numbers aren’t as important as they once were.
“We’ve been taught over the years that our social security number is the key to our lives.”
Allmond says for a hacker to really compromise your identity, he would need your physical and email address and your cell phone number, too.
“It’s not good to have your social security number out there, but it’s not end all, be all of a security breech.”
As far as stopping the breach, Allmond says our viewer did the right thing.
“One of the quickest ways I can find out how to fix an issue is when someone sends me a screen shot of it. I can look at it and I can say ‘oh that’s exactly the issue we can fix that in 5 minutes.’”
Allmond says if you think your info has been compromised to keep an eye on your credit report for the next month or so. He says you can even call the credit bureaus to put a freeze on your account if needed.
