Tag Archives: hacking

U.S. authorities on Wednesday put the Israeli maker of the Pegasus spyware on a list of restricted companies, taking aim at software central to a scandal over surveillance of journalists and officials. The company, NSO, was engulfed in controversy over reports that tens of thousands of human rights activists, journalists, …

Tech giant Google has exposed how Iranian-backed groups attempt to use its platforms to carry out espionage on behalf of the government in Tehran. In a blog post released on Thursday, Google’s Threat Analysis Group exposed the work of APT35, a shady hacking group that Google said is linked to …

Leaked documents have revealed Iran’s secret research into how the Republic’s cyber capacity could be used to sink cargo ships, blow up a petrol station or other forms of cyber assault, according to a report by Sky News. The leaked documents — a set of internal files — also include information …

An Israeli group sold a tool for hacking Microsoft Windows, Microsoft and technology human rights group Citizen Lab announced Thursday, highlighting the growing business of finding and selling tools for hacking widely used software. Hacking tool vendor Candiru developed and sold a software exploit that can break into Windows, one …

Facebook says it has disrupted a long-running cyberespionage campaign run by Palestinian intelligence which features spies posing as journalists and the deployment of a booby-trapped app for submitting human rights stories. In a report published Wednesday, Facebook (FB.O) accused what it said was the cyber wing of the Palestinian Preventive Security Service …

A former FBI lawyer was sentenced to probation on Friday for altering an email the Justice Department relied on in its surveillance of an aide to President Donald Trump during the Russia investigation. Kevin Clinesmith apologized for doctoring the email about Carter Page’s relationship with the CIA, saying he was …

By Emad El-Din Aysha, PhD     “Fucking men like you built the hydrogen bomb. Men like you thought it up. You think you’re so creative. You don’t know what it’s like to really create something; to create a life; to feel it growing inside you. All you know how …

Julian Assange is “free to return home” to Australia once legal challenges against him are dealt with, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Tuesday, after a UK court denied a request to extradite the Wikileaks founder to the United States. A British judge on Monday blocked the extradition request by …

The U.S. cybersecurity agency said on Wednesday that a sprawling cyber espionage campaign made public earlier this month is affecting state and local governments, although it released few additional details. The hacking campaign, which used U.S. tech company SolarWinds as a springboard to penetrate federal government networks, was “impacting enterprise …

Tech giants including Microsoft and Google on Monday joined Facebook’s legal battle against hacking company NSO, filing an amicus brief in federal court that warned that the Israeli firm’s tools were “powerful, and dangerous.” The brief, filed before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, opens up a …

U.S. prosecutors have seized a network of web domains which they said were used in a campaign by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to spread political disinformation around the world. In a statement released late on Wednesday, the Justice Department said it had taken control of 92 domains used by …

The man who leaked the “Pentagon Papers” about the Vietnam War defended Julian Assange at his London extradition hearing on Wednesday, saying WikiLeaks had acted in the public interest and warning Assange would not get a fair trial in the United States. Australian-born Assange, 49, is fighting to stop being …

A senior aide to the Connecticut federal prosecutor in charge of investigating the origins of the FBI’s probe into contacts between Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia has resigned from the Justice Department, a spokesman for the prosecutor’s office said. Nora Dannehy, who had been working with Connecticut U.S. attorney …

Russia and China dismissed on Friday allegations by Microsoft Corp MSFT.O that hackers linked to Moscow and Beijing were trying to spy on people tied to both U.S. President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden. Advisers to both presidential campaigns are assessing risks from digital spies around the globe, …

Julian Assange resumes his battle in a London court on Monday to avoid extradition to the United States to face criminal charges over the activities of his WikiLeaks website, after months of delay due to the coronavirus lockdown. The U.S. authorities accuse Australian-born Assange, 49, of conspiring to hack government …

The Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee on Sunday accused U.S. Attorney General William Barr of lying when he said China posed a bigger threat to November’s U.S. election than Russia. “That’s just a plain false statement by the attorney general,” Adam Schiff told CNN. “What Bill …

Only 8 percent of organizations in Saudi Arabia are considered “leaders” in “cyber resilience” compared with 17 percent globally, according to a new study that identifies how well organizations are prepared to defend themselves against cyberattacks. The study, carried out by the multinational professional services company Accenture, said that companies …

Israel foiled a major cyber attack on one of its power stations a few months ago, Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said on Wednesday. “It was a very serious, sophisticated attempt trying to control and paralyze one of our power stations,” Steinitz told the CyberTech conference in Tel Aviv, without elaborating. …

U.S. cyber attacks against Iranian targets have not been successful, Iran’s telecoms minister said on Monday, within days of reports that the Pentagon had launched a long-planned cyber attack to disable his country’s rocket launch systems. Tension is running high between longtime foes Iran and the United States after U.S. …

A veteran Republican operative and opposition researcher solicited and raised at least $100,000 from donors as part of an effort to obtain what he believed to be emails stolen from Hillary Clinton, activities that remain of intense interest to federal investigators working for special counsel Robert Mueller’s office and on …

The rulers of the United Arab Emirates had been using Israeli spyware for more than a year, secretly turning the smartphones of dissidents at home or rivals abroad into surveillance devices. So when top Emirati officials were offered a pricey update of the spying technology, they wanted to make sure …

President Trump tweeted early Wednesday that China was behind a hack of Hillary Clinton’s emails, in an apparent reference to an article published by the conservative Daily Caller website. China denied the allegation. The article, by reporter Richard Pollack, cites two anonymous sources and says a Chinese-owned company based outside …

Microsoft said Tuesday it has uncovered new Russian hacking attempts targeting U.S. political groups ahead of the midterm elections. The company said that a hacking group tied to the Russian government created fake internet domains that appeared to spoof two American conservative organizations: the Hudson Institute and the International Republican …

FBI Director Christopher Wray said Wednesday that he stands by the U.S. intelligence agencies’ assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, and he warned that the Kremlin has not stopped trying to undermine American democracy. “My view has not changed, which is that Russia attempted to interfere with the …

For nearly five years, the young Russian political science student was an unusual fixture at the most important events of the US conservative movement. Maria Butina, who was indicted this week on charges of being a covert Russian agent, struck up friendships with the influential leaders of the National Rifle …

A number of Israeli websites were hacked Tuesday to display pro-Palestinian messages in what experts said was the start of the annual cyberattack by the hacker collective known as “Anonymous.” Homepages for the municipality websites for Kfar Saba, Eilat, Herzliya and Acre were changed to display the message: “Jerusalem is the …

Cybercriminals are rapidly adding cryptojacking as a new avenue to increase its revenue stream and initiate attacks as the ransomware market becomes overpriced and overcrowded, an industry expert said. Haider Pasha, chief technology officer for emerging markets at Symantec Middle East, told Gulf News that browser-based cryptocurrency mining, also known …

The Trump administration alleged Friday that Iranian government-linked hackers conducted a “massive and brazen” hacking scheme, breaking into the accounts of roughly 8,000 professors at hundreds of US and foreign universities, as well as private companies and government entities, to steal huge amounts of data and intellectual property. The indictment …

Cambridge Analytica has suspended its CEO, Alexander Nix. The London-based company, which is accused of using data from 50 million Facebook users to influence the 2016 presidential campaign, announced the move Tuesday afternoon — one day after the release of a video that appears to show Nix acknowledging the firm’s …

Facebook suspended Cambridge Analytica, a data-analysis firm that worked for President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, over allegations that it held onto improperly obtained user data after telling Facebook it had deleted the information. The social network issued a blog post explaining its decision, although the tale is convoluted. Years ago, …

An organization that was part of President Trump’s transition team claimed Saturday that special counsel Robert S. Mueller III improperly obtained a trove of transition emails as part of the inquiry into Russian influence in the 2016 election and other matters. The batch of emails totaling thousands of pages of …

Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s senior adviser and son-in-law, is worried about the widening scope of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interferencein the 2016 election, Vanity Fair reported. As part of his investigation, Mueller is looking into whether members of the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow to tilt the election in his favor. Mueller’s office …

UAE Central Bank is taking measures to mitigate risks arising out of cyber-attacks and is planning to set up a dedicated department to deal with the issue, its governor said in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday. “Cyber risks go hand in hand with digitalization of financial services,” said Mubarak Rashed Al …

George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump‘s presidential campaign, pleaded guilty this month to making false statements to FBI agents about his correspondence with Russian nationals and attempts to arrange a meeting between the campaign and Russian officials. Interested in Russia Investigation? Add Russia Investigation as an interest …

He did not specify who should take such action, though critics have accused him of trying to improperly sway the inquiries. President Trump’s frustration at the investigations into his campaign’s ties with Russia boiled over on Sunday, as he sought to shift the focus to a litany of accusations against …

In 2015, Israeli government hackers saw something suspicious in the computers of a Moscow-based cybersecurity firm: hacking tools that could only have come from the National Security Agency. Israel notified the NSA, where alarmed officials immediately began a hunt for the breach, according to people familiar with the matter, who …

A trove of classified military documents, including the joint South Korea-US wartime operational plans for conflict with Pyongyang, were stolen by North Korean hackers, a lawmaker in Seoul said. Lee Cheol-hee, a member of the ruling Democratic party, on Tuesday said hackers had broken into a defence data centre in …

Russian government-backed hackers stole highly classified U.S. cyber secrets in 2015 from the National Security Agency after a contractor put information on his home computer, two newspapers reported on Thursday. As reported first by The Wall Street Journal, citing unidentified sources, the theft included information on penetrating foreign computer networks …

Global accounting firm Deloitte [DLTE.UL] said on Monday it was the victim of a cyber attack that affected the data of a small number of clients, providing few details on the breach. Deloitte said in a statement that attackers accessed data from the company’s email platform, confirming some details in a report by the Guardian …

The Department of Homeland Security contacted election officials in 21 states Friday to notify them that they had been targeted by Russian government hackers during the 2016 election campaign. Three months ago, DHS officials said that people connected to the Russian government tried to hack voter registration files or public …

The Securities and Exchange Commission, the country’s top Wall Street regulator, announced Wednesday that hackers breached its system for storing documents filed by publicly traded companies last year, potentially accessing data that allowed the intruders to make an illegal profit.The agency detected the breach last year, but didn’t learn until last …

Thirty-six U.S. senators on Tuesday called on federal authorities to investigate the sale of nearly $2 million in shares of credit bureau Equifax Inc (EFX.N) by company executives after a massive data breach, and one compared their actions to insider trading. The lawmakers signed a letter asking the U.S. Department …

Qatar’s attorney general said Turkey has detained five suspects in connection with the hacking of Qatar’s state news agency in May. The hacking helped precipitate the diplomatic rift that has since opened up between Qatar and some of its powerful Arab neighbors. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the United Arab …

Russia has been pressing demands that the US give it access to two diplomatic compounds seized in the US last year. After high-level talks between both sides, one Russian official involved said the row had “almost” been resolved. Russia has been angered by the move, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov …