United States of America - suffering an irrational and unfounded fear of Russian Hacking?
https://crimeshop.org/2017/01/02/us-suffers-an-irrational-and-unfounded-fear-of-russian-hacking/
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Showing posts with label Russian Hackers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Russian Hackers. Show all posts
Monday, January 2, 2017
Friday, December 30, 2016
NSA - finally shows us what they are good at
NSA - finally shows us what they are good at
https://crimeshop.org/2016/12/30/nsa-finally-shows-us-what-they-are-good-at/
https://crimeshop.org
Tuesday, December 20, 2016
Russian hackers - used Harvard paper to hack nonprofits
Russian hackers - used Harvard paper to hack nonprofits
https://crimeshop.org/2016/12/20/russian-hackers-used-harvard-paper-to-hack-nonprofits/
https://crimeshop.org
https://crimeshop.org/2016/12/20/russian-hackers-used-harvard-paper-to-hack-nonprofits/
https://crimeshop.org
Monday, December 12, 2016
US Presidential Election - Time for a Real Investigation
US Presidential Election - Time for a Real Investigation
https://crimeshop.org/2016/12/12/us-presidential-election-time-for-a-real-investigation/
https://crimeshop.org
https://crimeshop.org/2016/12/12/us-presidential-election-time-for-a-real-investigation/
https://crimeshop.org
Wednesday, September 14, 2016
U.S. Department of Justice - Resorting to veiled threats...against the Kremlin?
U.S. Department of Justice - Resorting to veiled threats...against the Kremlin?
Instead of resort to preventative measures
In light of the recent political hacks here in the U.S. today, 9/14/16, the Justice Department dropped a couple of hints that they do in fact, plan to hold Russia accountable for what is suspected to be a broad hacking campaign that has targeted U.S. political organizations and election databases.
Assistant Attorney General John Carlin said “You’ve seen us use it time and again, the message is clear: You are not safe because you are doing it under another nation’s flag. We can figure out who did it ... and when we do, we’re committed to holding people accountable.”
True enough, we have seen it and heard it, over and over again. What we are more interested in seeing are preventative measures. Something along the lines of being proactive rather than reactive.
Both Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Assistant Attorney General John Carlin fell short of actually coming right out and saying they in fact knew that Russia was behind the recent hacks in today’s announcement.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch had this to say: “Whether you are a rogue hacker or a uniformed soldier, the shadowy corners of the internet will not provide respite for long. The light of our efforts is bright, the reach of our resolve is long. There literally is no hiding place.”
Yet, whomever these hackers are, they have still managed to be hiding, they are unnamed, they have no face for us to look upon, we don’t even really know where they reside, for all we know, the hacks could have all been inside jobs.
Information and access can both be bought and sold for a fairly reasonable price these days...
Assistant Attorney General John Carlin named Russia as one of the 4 main actors that have been involved in supporting hackers targeting the U.S., the other 3 are North Korea, Iran and China.
While it’s true that the U.S. has taken action against hackers with regards to hacks against Sony Pictures, financial institutions and U.S. companies. The action taken so far was against North Korea, Iran and China, nothing for Russia.
Russia has been suspected of the Democratic Party hacks, as well as for hacks into election systems in both Arizona and Illinois. The word on the street is, they did it in an effort to disrupt the November elections.
Forbes reported that Edward Snowden suspected Russia as being behind the leak over at the NSA last month, something I am personally convinced is part of an inside job, rather than Russia kicking down the air-gapped network doors of the NSA.
Right now Russia is also being accused of hacking the medical records of Olympic Athletes...
President Obama has not acknowledged that he believes Russia is behind the hacks either. At least not publicly.
In Fact, so far most Government officials have hesitated at pointing the blame to Russia and Russia has denied any involvement in the recent hacks.
All save for...
Senator John McCain-R Arizona who today subtly suggested that “Russia is conducting cyber-attacks to undermine American interests at every turn.”
It’s one thing to have irrefutable evidence against someone, it’s an entirely different thing to blame someone for something you cannot prove they did.
It’s unforgivable to place blame on a very public level…When you lack THE EVIDENCE to support that!
What’s that thing we tell all criminals in this country...oh help me out here, isn’t it something along the lines of, being innocent until proven guilty…
Don’t we also allow for defendants to ask for and receive a change of venue if they feel they will not get a fair trial where they were charged because so much media attention was placed on the case that they feel the public, their jury would not give them a fair shot?
Way to practice that public persecution thing here, we are publicly persecuting another country who the U.S. Government hasn’t proven did anything.
I keep seeing headlines suggesting what the U.S. might do should they discover Russia was behind the recent hacks.
What I am not seeing is what the U.S. plans to do if they learn that Russia in fact, had absolutely nothing to do with the recent hacks?
It matters not right now who is behind the hacks as far as the public is concerned, what matters is that our Government is taking steps to prevent future hacks while at the same time investigates what did happen without and this is important, casting blame on another country.
For a country that wants to be a world leader, be seen and known as a world leader, this blame game is not the move a progressive, forward thinking world leading country, would make.
Whether or not someone is hacking for the Russian Government, or it’s a lone hacker if it were me, I’d hold off on blaming anyone outright until I did have irrefutable proof.
While we are all focused on who did it, we are failing to see and realize these hacks clearly illustrate our inability as a nation to prevent cyber attacks.
These hacks illustrate our weakness when it comes to the cyber world.
Because of that, I wouldn’t want to risk rocking the boat without having proof to back up my accusations because until anyone can prove anything...we are still pretty vulnerable to yet another hack and/or cyber attack.
From a still unknown and unnamed hacker or group of hackers.
Cristal M Clark
Monday, August 22, 2016
Hacking the NSA is so easy a child could do it...from the inside.
NSA hack an inside Job
or is the Russian Government using hackers to breach everything
A newly published article today accuses Russian hackers of breaching the Olympic drug testing agency…
Many assumed that Russia was behind the hack of the DNC.
Headlines last Friday suggest that Russia has hacked The Donald’s campaign.
Everyone assumes that Russia is behind the hack of the NSA and Edward Snowden has reportedly issued a statement that indicates Russia was most likely responsible for the hack at the NSA.
What the hell haven’t they hacked? Wait, they have not hacked Starbuck’s making it so that I have a lifetime supply of coffee.
It could have been Russia who by the way denies any involvement in these hacks.
What was the loot in the NSA hack?
Well as it so happens the hack exposed cyber-weapons intel. That intel reveals just how the NSA hacks suspects and enemies and further details a tracking code that just so happens to reveal the fingerprints of the NSA's malicious software.
So we really have to wonder what Russia might have to gain if they are truly behind the hack of the NSA? I mean the DNC might have been a just for fun type of thing if Russia was behind it, but what about the NSA? Does Russia feel the NSA had at one time infiltrated them and downloaded some type of malicious software?
To fully understand that, you need to get to know The Equation Group and TAO, two branches of the NSA.
Kaspersky labs describes The Equation Group as “one of the most sophisticated cyber attack groups in the world.” The Equation Group according to Kaspersky labs has operated alongside Stuxnet and Flame.
TAO identifies, monitors and has a nasty little habit of infiltrating and gathering intelligence on computer systems used by foreign entities to the US.
Anyone who has seen the Stuxnet documentary knows that it is widely believed that Stuxnet was created jointly by the US and Israel.
Which makes total sense because Israel is reportedly 15 years ahead of everyone else in terms of Cyber-Defense and Security.
Russia however, was one of the named 42 countries that the Equation Group infiltrated over the course of its 14 year project creating backdoors to foreign Government networks.
Not only did the Equation Group create backdoors, they also seemed to enjoy intercepting hardware from IT companies, globally.
It’s also worth mentioning that the Equation Group has a pretty good reputation for using strong ENCRYPTION methods. They just can’t seem to figure out a way around encryption when folks like Apple create it for consumers to use.
So who kicked in the door at the NSA?
A group called Shadow Brokers took the credit for hacking the NSA. Things got a little crazy when they came out because they boasted rather audaciously and offered to auction off the goods for $576 Bitcoins.
Bidders backed way off and the general consensus has been that those responsible for the breach were not just some run of the mill hackers but a foreign Government, hiding behind the idea the breach was caused by a group of nobody hackers.
From that, another theory sparked a lot of interest and that was, that someone inside of the NSA was in fact responsible for the leaked intel.
Out of all of the theories, this is actually what more than likely happened.
The NSA stores sensitive information on air-gapped networks, which are networks that are not connected to the internet, i.e. the outside world. They also have other security measures, not to mention despite being a pain in the ass to crack, it’s still doable.
They can be cracked through the use of undetected malware, cell phones, as Edward Snowden proved a flash drive, even a sim card can do the trick.
The point is, it’s pretty clear that the responsible party is within the ranks at the NSA.
Now, I am not saying that I am convinced that Edward Snowden had anything to do with it however…
A strange sequence of events happened shortly before the breach.
On 8/5, Edward Snowden reached out through Twitter, with an odd message to those that knew him or who ever worked with him asking them to contact him followed by 64 characters of code. That message lead many to believe that Edward had been captured or killed and failed to do a check-in prompting his account to send out a dead man’s switch. His account went silent after the odd tweets.
Shortly after that, at least 8 torrent sites had been taken down or slowed. The sites are well known to distribute large files.
News of the hack and leak at the NSA broke on 8/15
Edward Snowden began tweeting again on 8/15
Edward Snowden seems to think that the Russian Government is behind some of these hacks and has said as much through the media....initially it was almost as if he was handing out the idea like we hand out candy at Halloween.
And I, don’t believe in coincidence.
I also don’t believe that the Russian Government was behind the hacks. It’s too neatly wrapped with the bow neatly tied on top.
Blaming the Russian Government seems too easy, too perfect and too convenient.
The hack came from the inside and the NSA just got owned again.
Cristal M Clark
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