The Washington Post said on Wednesday that servers used by employees were hacked and it suspects the intrusion was carried out by Chinese hackers.
The hackers gained access to employee user names and passwords, the company said. The extent of the loss of company data was not immediately clear, but the newspaper assumes that many or all of its employee usernames and passwords may have been compromised. As a result, employees will be ordered to change them.
There was no sign that the hackers gained access to the Post’s publishing system, e-mails or to employees’ sensitive personal information.
The hack was the second major recent intrusion, company officials said. Evidence strongly pointed to Chinese hackers in the other one, which was discovered in 2011.
Post officials learned of the intrusion on Wednesday from a cybersecurity contractor that monitors its networks. They said it was of relatively short duration.
Officials said they saw no evidence that the Post’s publishing system was accessed by the hackers.