SolarWinds says SEC investigation ‘progressing to charges’

SolarWinds — the technology firm at the center of a December 2020 hack that affected multiple U.S. government agencies — said its executives may soon face charges from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its response to the incident.

The widespread hack – which the U.S. government attributed to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service – affected several large companies as well as the Defense Department, Justice Department, Commerce Department, Treasury Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, the Department of Energy and more.

Hackers found a way to insert malware into a version of the company’s Orion IT monitoring application, allowing Russian operatives to gain a foothold in high-value targets. They used the access to deploy additional malware to compromise internal and cloud-based systems and steal sensitive information over several months.