HOUSTON – An organization that has spent nearly two decades searching for missing people across the Houston area and other parts of the world now is looking for the culprits who hacked its email system.
The intrusion into EquuSearch's server is more than just an inconvenience.
The hacks have already cost at least one member thousands of dollars.
"His emails were hacked and actually to the point where he had four different bank accounts," Equusearch founder and director Tim Miller said. "(The) money was all combined into one account and then withdrawn and not a little amount: $37,000."
But Miller said the hack also could involve the families of people EquuSearch is searching for.
"There's a lot of personal information on there that we don't want to get out," Miller said. "Just us and law enforcement have that information."
The hack at this point isn't jeopardizing any current cases -- but EquuSearch has brought in law enforcement and IT technicians to determine the source of the attack.
"We're all targets. It doesn't matter who we are," Miller said. "Unfortunately it's a world that we live in. Unfortunately it appears as though it's getting worse every day."
Equusearch was founded in 2000.
The organization has a network of more than 700 members potentially impacted by the hacks.