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Houston Housing Authority

Claimed by Meow · listed 2 years ago

38 GB
Data size
20m
Age
since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

  1. ListedOct 31, 2024
  2. Data leakeddate unknown

At a glance

Group
Meow
Status
Data leaked
Country
United States
Sector
Government
Listed on leak site
Oct 31, 2024
Data size
38 GB

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

The Houston Housing Authority (HHA) is a federal government agency serving over 60,000 residents in Houston. It administers affordable housing programs including the Housing Choice Voucher Program (formerly Section 8) and public housing initiatives, offering rental assistance and support services to families, seniors, and persons with disabilities. HHA operates under U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) guidelines.

Industry
Government — Public Housing & Social Services
Address
Houston, Texas, United States

Attack summary

Severity: critical — Confirmed exfiltration of highly sensitive personal data at scale (38 GB), including Social Security numbers, identification documents, and personal information for 60,000+ residents of a vulnerable population (low-income families, seniors, persons with disabilities). Data includes regulated PII and government-held records. Impacts critical public infrastructure.

The Meow ransomware group claims to have exfiltrated approximately 38 GB of confidential data from HHA. The group states it has obtained employee records, client information, financial documents, and personal identifying information and is offering this data for sale on its leak site.

critical

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post
  • Employee personal details and identification documents
  • Social Security numbers and cards
  • Client contact details and rental assistance records
  • Confidentiality agreements and service contracts
  • Real estate purchase records and financial documents
  • Invoices and debt obligations
  • Insurance certificates and tax forms
  • Dates of birth and ID scans

What the group claims

<p>Dear customers!</p><p>We are excited to offer you exclusive access to over 38 GB of confidential data from the Houston Housing Authority HHA, an agency dedicated to providing affordable housing options and support services for low income residents in Houston. Serving over 60,000 individuals, HHA operates various programs, including the Housing Choice Voucher Program formerly Section 8 and public housing initiatives, offering rental assistance to families, seniors, and persons with disabilities to help them secure private housing in the community.</p><p>HHA manages public housing properties and collaborates with community partners to deliver additional services like education, job training, and family self sufficiency programs, aiming to enhance residents economic opportunities. The organization operates under federal guidelines from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development HUD and adheres to fair housing regulations to ensure equitable access.</p><p>This comprehensive data pack includes:</p><p>Employee data personal details, Social Security cards, ID scans<br>Client information contact details, rental assistance records<br>Contracts and agreements confidentiality agreements, service contracts<br>Financial documents real estate purchase records, invoices, debt obligations<br>Liability insurance certificates and tax forms<br>Personal data dates of birth, Social Security numbers, ID scans<br>And much more<br>These records offer valuable insights into the Houston Housing Authoritys operations, providing essential information for professionals in the housing sector, public administration, and business analysis.</p><p>To gain access to this exclusive 38 GB data pack, simply click the Buy button and provide your contact details for registration. Our team will assist you in ensuring a secure and confidential transaction.</p><p>Dont miss this opportunity to explore key information from the Houston Housing Authority HHA with this exclusive data pack!</p><p>&nbs

Sources

Source

Indexed 2 years ago

This page surfaces a public ransomware disclosure indexed by Darkfield. Original posts come from the operator's own leak site; we cross-check against ransomware.live, RansomLook and RansomWatch where applicable. Share this URL freely.

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Disclosure context

About Meow

Meow is a relatively new ransomware group that emerged in November 2023, primarily motivated by financial gain through extortion activities targeting organizations across multiple sectors. The group has compromised at least 145 known victims in a short operational timeframe, demonstrating rapid scaling of their criminal enterprise. Based on their targeting patterns, Meow appears to focus heavily on English-speaking countries, with the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada representing their primary victim base, though they have also expanded operations to include targets in Italy and Colombia. The group shows a preference for attacking business services organizations, manufacturing companies, healthcare institutions, and agriculture and food production entities, suggesting they may employ broad-spectrum targeting rather than highly specialized sector focus. Their emergence in late 2023 and the significant victim count achieved in a relatively short period indicates either a sophisticated operation with experienced operators or potential links to existing ransomware ecosystems, though specific details about their attack methodology, initial access vectors, encryption techniques, or data exfiltration practices have not been extensively documented by major threat intelligence sources. Given the recent timeline of their emergence and limited public reporting from established security researchers, detailed technical analysis of their tools, tactics, and procedures remains sparse. The group appears to remain active as of current reporting, though comprehensive law enforcement actions or major disruption efforts have not been publicly documented. The group has been linked to 145 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on November 24, 2023; most recent post November 19, 2024. The operation is currently inactive.

Timeline of this disclosure

  • October 31, 2024Houston Housing Authority listed by Meowon the group's public leak site
Data size
38 GB

Other recent disclosures by Meow

Meow has been linked to 145 public victims on Darkfield. A sample of the most recent:

See the full Meow dossier →

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Government sector, which has 685 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, Houston Housing Authority is reported in United States, a country with 11,033 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

If your organisation is affected

A listing by Meow means Houston Housing Authority appeared on a ransomware extortion site and data attributed to it has been published. If this is your organisation, or a supplier you depend on, the priority is to confirm the intrusion and contain it before the window to act closes.

  • Engage your incident-response team and preserve forensic evidence before remediating — do not wipe affected systems first.
  • Force a password reset and revoke active sessions for exposed accounts; rotate any credentials, API keys or certificates that may have been in the stolen data.
  • Assess regulatory notification duties (GDPR, NIS2, sector regulators) — many carry a 72-hour reporting clock from awareness.
  • Report the incident to your national CERT, CISA (United States), as required for your jurisdiction.
  • Monitor for the data appearing on Meow's leak site and across paste and breach channels, and brief downstream partners who may be exposed through you.

How we know this. Darkfield monitors public ransomware leak sites continuously, archiving every new disclosure and the data later released against the victim. Each entry on this page is sourced from the operator's own publication and cross-checked against complementary OSINT feeds (RansomLook, ransomware.live, RansomWatch). We do not collect or host stolen data — only the metadata, timestamps and screenshots needed to make the public disclosure searchable and accountable. Records here are corrected when the original post is edited, retracted, or merged with another disclosure.