Cybercriminals trick some USPS workers, steal paychecks

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CHARLOTTE — Action 9′s Jason Stoogenke has discovered that some postal employees mistakenly shared personal information on websites created by cybercriminals.

A woman who did not want to be publicly identified, says she’s one of the employees who fell victim.

“Susan” says her Jan. 6 paycheck, which included extra hours from time she worked during the holidays, went to the wrong bank.

Here’s what Stoogenke pieced together from various sources involved in the delivery of your mail, including USPS, the National Association of Letter Carriers, the National Association of Postal Supervisors, and the National Postal Mail Handlers Union:

“I still have to come to work every day. Still try to do my job and still smile even though I’m depleting my funds, my savings,” she said. “I have (a) mortgage. I have groceries. I have gas. Everything is expensive these days and I cannot afford to miss out on my paycheck.”

Postal workers use a website called “LiteBlue” for a lot of their Human Resources needs. Cybercriminals set up fake websites that looked like LiteBlue and employees mistakenly went to those sites and shared personal information. It is not clear how many employees did this.

Scammers used the information to access the Postal Service’s payroll system called PostalEASE and alter paycheck information, including redirecting paychecks to other bank accounts.

Postal officials say this is not a hack and their system is still secure. They told Stoogenke that:

- Impacted workers have been contacted.

- New IT security features have been implemented.

- They will provide one year of credit monitoring services for victims.

They have not said what they’re doing to retrieve the money.

This is the correct website is liteblue.usps.gov/wps/myportal. The fake websites misspell “lite” as “light” or “blue” as “blu” or use a different extension instead of .gov such as .com, .org, or .net.

(VIDEO: Thieves steal mail twice from same Cotswold mailboxes in just weeks)

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