Signal Gate: One Wrong Number Triggered the Largest U.S. Gov Data Leak
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Signal Gate Exposed: Shadow IT’s Role in 2025’s Biggest Leak
When a group of U.S. government and military officials chose Signal to share classified information, they assumed it was a secure choice. But one contact mistake was all it took to trigger a major leak – and a hard lesson in governance.
In this episode of Threat Talks, host Rob Maas is joined by AMS-IX Security Officer Thomas Manolis to break down the leak known as Signal Gate, and what it teaches us about the risks of shadow IT and human error.
Key topics:
· Why Signal was never the problem
· How a simple contact mix-up triggered a breach
· The balance between usability and security
Your cybersecurity experts
Rob Maas
Field CTO
ON2IT
Thomas Manolis
Information Security Office,
AMS-IX
Episode details
In March 2025, government and military officials used the Signal messaging app to coordinate and share classified information. But a contact list mistake added a journalist to the group chat, exposing sensitive plans that could have cost lives.
In this episode of Threat Talks, host Rob Maas is joined by Thomas Manolis, Security Officer at AMS-IX. Together, they explore what led officials to bypass their own internal secure comms, how a single human error triggered the leak, and what lessons we can learn from this leak.
One of the biggest leaks of 2025 started with a decision to use Signal instead of secure internal communications. Stay tuned to find out what went wrong.
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