Another cyber attack is jeopardizing the personal information of victims of child sex abuse at the hands of the Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore.
Stinson LLP, a law firm representing the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the church’s bankruptcy case, announced they were breached by cyber hackers in February.
The attack was not disclosed until June, according to court documents.
Stinson is now taking steps to keep survivors and the court informed about what information may have been leaked.
The firm says it will provide quarterly updates and report any findings of confidential information posted on the internet.
The breach is especially concerning for survivors because many entered into the legal proceedings anonymously due to the nature of the abuse they faced as children.
This is the second cyber breach to impact survivors of childhood abuse at the hands of the Archdiocese.
In May, Berkeley Research Group, a financial advisor working on the case, announced that it was infiltrated by cyber criminals.
BRG acts as a financial advisor for the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the bankruptcy of the Archdiocese of Baltimore. It also advises nine other committees in other religious organization cases across the nation.
“BRG believed it was important that the Incident Notices be filed simultaneously,” wrote Timothy Karcher, counsel for BRG wrote in a letter to the court. “BRG also recognized that the risk of providing potentially incomplete or inaccurate information, with less clarity, on a faster timeline, was significantly outweighed by the benefit of developing a firmer, more accurate understanding of the impact to the subject cases and stakeholders before filing the incident notices.”
BRG stated in the letter that it paid a settlement to the hackers and received a destruction log to show that information was not leaked.
The Baltimore Archdiocese filed for bankruptcy in fall 2023, right before Maryland’s Child Victims Act went into effect.
There are as many as 1,000 claimants who are filing against the church for abuse that stems back decades.
