The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on Tuesday issued a public apology to billionaire Ken Griffin and thousands of Americans, including former President Donald Trump and Elon Musk who had their personal information leaked to the media.
"The Internal Revenue Service sincerely apologizes to Mr. Kenneth Griffin and the thousands of other Americans whose personal information was leaked to the press," the IRS said in a statement. "The IRS takes its responsibilities seriously and acknowledges that it failed to prevent Mr. Littlejohn's criminal conduct and unlawful disclosure of Mr. Griffin's confidential data."
"Accordingly, the IRS assures Mr. Griffin and the other victims of Mr. Littlejohn's actions that it has made substantial investments in its data security to strengthen its safeguarding of taxpayer information. These investments address potential weaknesses in the IRS's systems as identified by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), which provides independent oversight of the IRS," the statement continued, adding it will continue to work to address potential vulnerabilities.
The public apology comes as part of a settlement to a lawsuit brought by Citadel CEO Griffin against the IRS in the wake of the data breach, which occurred when IRS contractor Charles Littlejohn used his access to confidential tax return information to leak that data belonging to thousands of wealthy Americans to news outlets between 2018 and 2020.
Citadel CEO and founder Ken Griffin filed the lawsuit against the IRS to ensure the agency protects taxpayers' sensitive data. (Photographer: Christopher Pike/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)
Littlejohn improperly accessed the data through an IRS database and uploaded the tax returns to a private website as a means of circumventing the agency's safeguards to prevent large downloads or uploads from IRS devices and systems.
He then saved the tax returns on multiple storage devices before passing along the data to media outlets in 2019 and 2020. Littlejohn gave Trump's tax information to the New York Times and provided data on others, including Griffin and Musk, to ProPublica.
Griffin was one of thousands of wealthy Americans whose personal data was leaked to the press by an ex-IRS contractor. (Photo by Vernon Yuen/NurPhoto via Getty Images / Getty Images)
In January, the 38-year-old Littlejohn was sentenced to five years in prison after he pleaded guilty to unauthorized disclosure of tax returns and return information.
"I am grateful to my team for securing an outcome that will better protect American taxpayers and that will ultimately benefit all Americans," Griffin said in a statement reacting to the IRS apology amid the settlement.
Griffin is set to appear on Fox News' "Special Report" on Tuesday.