Category Archives: DNC

Weekly Cyber Risk Roundup: Spain-Catalonia Conflict Goes Digital, Russian Hacking Revealed

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The Spanish government was the week’s top trending cybercrime target due to a series of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) and other attacks that were orchestrated by the hacktivist group Anonymous. The Anonymous’ campaign against the Spanish government comes on the heels of  Catalonia’s recent referendum on independence. As Miguel-Anxo Murado wrote in The New York Review… Read More

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DNC hackers using NATO cyber conference to find phishing targets, researchers find

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Security researchers recently found evidence showing that the same infamous hacking group responsible for last year’s breach at the Democratic National Committee were attempting to spy on people interested in an upcoming D.C.-based cybersecurity conference, according to Cisco’s Talos research team. In a blog post published Sunday, Talos noted that Group 74, otherwise known as APT28 or Fancy Bear recently sent a wave of  spear phishing emails carrying malware-laden Microsoft Word attachments. These malicious emails contained information regarding a conference known as CyCon that’s taking place in early November. The event is produced by the U.S. Army Cyber Institute in collaboration with NATO. The conference often features top leaders from both the U.S. government and other allied nations who help guide cybersecurity relevant policy and missions. “This attack is another example of sophisticated social engineering undertaken by the bad guys in order to trick their intended victims into opening malicious […]

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A reminder for why government officials really shouldn’t use personal email accounts

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Top government officials continue to use personal email accounts to conduct official business even as it comes with significant  risks and runs the risk of violating federal policy, experts say. High-ranking Trump administration officials have been reportedly relying on a blend of both professional and personal email accounts to send messages to their contacts, according to separate reports by the New York Times and Washington Post. These individuals include the President’s daughter, Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, both of whom hold official White House positions. Additionally, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn and presidential adviser Stephen Miller were also found to be using private email addresses. Former FBI Cyber Division Chief Technology Officer Milan Patel told CyberScoop that high ranking officials, like Kushner and Miller, run a high risk of targeted by nation-state sponsored hackers that seek to gather intelligence and personal details. These hackers would, Milan explained, first […]

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How the Democrats plan to stop hackers from breaching 2018 campaigns

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“Never again,” says Aaron Trujillo, chief of staff for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “That’s the message.” Roughly one year ago, the DCCC — the campaign arm for Democrats in the House of Representatives — revealed that its systems were breached by hackers. The cyberattacks, as it was later reported, were connected to a broader operation that included multiple computer intrusions into the Democratic National Committee, the party’s national organization. Closer to Election Day, it was revealed that there were links between the DCCC breach incident and the GRU, Russia’s premier military intelligence agency. Russian government officials quickly denied that the Kremlin was involved in either incident. The breach marked the beginning of a larger issue. In August 2016, less than one month after the DCCC hack had been publicly disclosed, a blog written under the moniker of  “Guccifer 2.0” began publishing thousands of sensitive, internal DCCC documents. They included […]

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Report: Obama admin planted cyber ‘bombs’ inside Russian infrastructure

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The Obama Administration reportedly planted cyber weapons within Russian infrastructure in 2016 to use in response to potential threats made by the Kremlin, according to the Washington Post. Through collaboration with members of the NSA, CIA and U.S. Cyber Command, according to the Washington Post, Obama gave his signature to a covert cyber operation designed “to be triggered remotely as part of retaliatory cyber-strike in the face of Russian aggression, whether an attack on a power grid or interference in a future presidential race.” The cyber weapons were “the digital equivalent of bombs that could be detonated if the United States found itself in an escalating exchange with Moscow,” but the project, including the “time sensitive” weapons, were never fully completed under Obama and the option for potential retaliation now rests with President Donald Trump. The Obama administration publicly announced a set of sanctions in December 2016 aimed at cracking […]

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Comey: Russians Targeted ‘Hundreds’ of Entities in Election Hacking

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Former FBI director James Comey’s testimony is a solid reminder that the Russian hacking campaign went far beyond the Democratic National Committee and John Podesta. Continue reading Comey: Russians Targeted ‘Hundreds’ of Entities in Election Hacking→

Comey: Russians Targeted ‘Hundreds’ of Entities in Election Hacking

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Former FBI director James Comey’s testimony is a solid reminder that the Russian hacking campaign went far beyond the Democratic National Committee and John Podesta. Continue reading Comey: Russians Targeted ‘Hundreds’ of Entities in Election Hacking→

Hackers are just doing their patriotic duty, according to Putin

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Russian President Vladimir Putin assured senior editors of leading international news agencies on Thursday that the Russian state has never taken part in hacking, according to the Associated Press. “Hackers are free people, just like artists who wake up in the morning in a good mood and start painting,” Putin said. “The hackers are the same, they would wake up, read about something going on in interstate relations and if they have patriotic leanings, they may try to add their contribution to the fight against those who speak badly about Russia.” Putin offered an explanation for recent cyberattacks of apparent Russian origins, proposing that falsified digital evidence may have been used in the past to smear Moscow. “I can imagine that some do it deliberately, staging a chain of attacks in such a way as to cast Russia as the origin of such an attack,” Putin said. “Modern technologies allow […]

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How phishing emails sent by Russian hackers produce propaganda

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In late 2015, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper famously warned of a future where adversaries will often “change or manipulate electronic information in order to compromise its integrity” rather than simply steal data. Since then, the world has watched the Kremlin carry out Clapper’s prediction, interfering in democratic processes around the world. A new report released Thursday, authored by the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs, shows how Russia has made Clapper’s prediction a reality. The research gives a new view on how hackers with suspected ties to the Russian government play a vital part in international disinformation campaigns aimed to discredit enemies of the state and sow discord. The report, “Tainted Leaks: Disinformation and Phishing With a Russian Nexus,” underscores how offensive cybersecurity operations have become a critical tool used by governments to weaponize information and affect public opinion. Hackers acting in […]

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