Michelle Obama passport scan appears online in apparent hack

The hacking group that leaked former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s emails has purported to have breached the email account of a White House staffer, posting the alleged passport of first lady Michelle Obama and a trove of messages online, NBC News reported.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch said it was “something that we are looking into”.

The group, however, also posted an image of what they claimed was the first lady’s passport, but the image revealed several discrepancies from what a passport typically looks like.

Mrs. Obama’s information was part of a batch of emails purportedly hacked from the Gmail account of a White House “advance” staffer who coordinated logistics for official trips spanning from February 2015 through July 2016.

The White House on Thursday declined to comment on their validity, but spokesman Josh Earnest said the administration was taking the matter seriously.

The leak is the latest in a set of files targeting U.S. politicians and political insiders to be disclosed by a group calling itself DC Leaks.

The Secret Service would not confirm the authenticity of the photo or communications. Although DCLeaks claims to be the work of “American hacktivists”, some security experts suspect that the site is a front for Russian state-sponsored hackers.