Category Archives: Rod Rosenstein

Rod Rosenstein is working with NSO Group, the Israeli firm accused of spying on dissidents

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Rod Rosenstein, a former deputy attorney general at the Department of Justice, has been providing counsel on cybersecurity and national security to NSO Group, the Israeli software surveillance firm accused of spying on human rights activists and journalists, according to court documents obtained by CyberScoop. Rosenstein’s work with NSO Group was revealed in court documents in relation to a lawsuit WhatsApp filed against the company, accusing them of surveilling over 1,000 WhatsApp users. “I have counseled NSO about cyber and national security issues and assisted the defense team” in the WhatsApp v. NSO Group case, Rosenstein said in the signed declaration. Rosenstein has been employed King & Spalding, the firm representing NSO Group, since January of this year. He previously served as deputy attorney general from 2017 through May 2019. The filing is an attempt to rebut WhatsApp’s claims that King & Spalding has a conflict of interest in the case because it has represented […]

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Congress must do more in fight against global cybercrime, advocacy group says

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In a speech to Interpol in November, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein lobbied other governments to do more to help Washington track down foreign cybercriminals. “By devoting appropriate resources to international cooperation efforts, we can properly address the increasing threat of cybercrime,” he said, adding later: “No nation should exempt itself from just and reasonable law enforcement cooperation.” Rosenstein was acknowledging that regardless of the Department of Justice’s investments in countering cybercrime in the United States, the department’s ability to put foreign crooks behind bars can rest, in part, on other governments’ cooperation in finding and extraditing them. That’s why, analysts say, it’s crucial to fund U.S. programs to boost foreign governments’ ability to crack down on hackers. A new advocacy effort from the think tank Third Way is trying to focus U.S. policymakers’ attention on making those programs more effective. “We think that the U.S. government should be […]

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Rosenstein warns encryption can be ‘significant detriment’ to public safety

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U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein warned technology companies that Americans will not accept a culture in which encryption makes it impossible for law enforcement to investigate crimes, the latest comments in a long effort by the Department of Justice to find a way around end-to-end encryption. In a speech Thursday, Rosenstein urged tech firms to develop technology that keeps users’ data and communication as secure as possible, while also maintaining the ability to provide that information to law enforcement if it’s tied to an investigation. Firms including Apple, WhatsApp and others have introduced end-to-end encryption, a security measure that renders messages unreadable except to the sender and recipient. That type of technology is having “a dramatic impact on our cases, to the significant detriment of public safety,” Rosenstein said. Rosenstein’s remarks at Georgetown University Law Center’s Cybercrime Conference come amid the years-long “Going Dark” debate in which the public […]

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U.S. indicts two over SamSam ransomware attacks that hit Atlanta, other cities

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The Department of Justice unsealed indictments Wednesday against two Iranian men for conducting ransomware attacks against more than 200 organizations inside the United States, including municipalities, government agencies and hospitals. Prosecutors say that Faramarz Shahi Savandi, 34, and Mohammad Mehdi Shah Mansouri, 27, used SamSam ransomware to lock the victims’ systems and demand bitcoin in order to decrypt their data. Savandi and Masouri racked up more than $6 million in ransom payments and caused more than $30 million in damages, according to the indictment issued by a grand jury in New Jersey. SamSam’s damage has been a public ordeal. The indictment includes notable cases like the attacks on the city of Atlanta, the city of Newark, the Port of San Diego, the Colorado Department of Transportation, and others. Six of the victims were health care-related organizations, prosecutors said. “Many of the victims were public agencies with missions that involve saving lives and performing other critical […]

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U.S. warns countries not to ‘manipulate the extradition process’ for cybercriminals

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The Department of Justice’s second-in-command has called on other countries to step up their efforts to extradite accused cybercriminals, warning that the U.S. will “expose” countries that “manipulate the extradition process.” “We will identify nations that routinely block the fair administration of justice and fail to act in good faith,” Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein told a general assembly of Interpol, an international police organization, on Sunday. “In some instances, nations shield their citizens from the rule of law with schemes that waste resources, cause needless delay, thwart investigative efforts, and undermine justice,” Rosenstein said in his prepared remarks. The U.S. processes extraditions “without regard to the nationality of the offender, but that cooperation must be reciprocated,” Rosenstein said. Rosenstein cited the case of Aleksey Belan, a Russian national charged with helping compromise 500 million Yahoo email accounts in 2014. In 2012, Belan was charged in a separate hack of […]

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Justice Department Indicts 12 Russian Nationals Tied to 2016 Election Hacking

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Indictments are part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 elections. Continue reading Justice Department Indicts 12 Russian Nationals Tied to 2016 Election Hacking→

DOJ Cyber Task Force expected to release first-ever report in late July

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The Department of Justice’s internal “Cyber-Digital Task Force,” created by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in February, will release its first-ever public report later this month at the Aspen Institute’s annual Security Forum, a department spokesperson told CyberScoop. The report is expected to detail a series of security recommendations that the government should consider to protect future U.S. elections from a myriad of different threats, including foreign hacking attempts. A statement by the DOJ previously explained that the Task Force will “prioritize its study of efforts to interfere with our elections; efforts to interfere with our critical infrastructure; the use of the Internet to spread violent ideologies and to recruit followers; the mass theft of corporate, governmental, and private information; the use of technology to avoid or frustrate law enforcement; and the mass exploitation of computers and other digital devices to attack American citizens and businesses.” When Sessions launched the group earlier this year, […]

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DOJ looks to improve handling of cyberthreats with new task force

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Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced a new cybersecurity task force on Tuesday that aims to appraise the way the Department of Justice handles cases that involve the internet. The Cyber-Digital Task Force “will canvass the many ways that the Department is combatting the global cyber threat, and will also identify how federal law enforcement can more effectively accomplish its mission in this vital and evolving area,” a news release said. Sessions said he is creating the task force in order to generate ideas on how to best combat global cyberthreats. “The Internet has given us amazing new tools that help us work, communicate, and participate in our economy, but these tools can also be exploited by criminals, terrorists, and enemy governments,” Sessions said. The deputy attorney general will appoint a senior department official to chair the task force. DOJ declined to provide any more information about the task force, such as […]

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Unexplained cyberattacks sow chaos among dark web markets

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A three-week long wave of cyberattacks against several popular dark web marketplaces has left the notorious underground e-commerce economy drenched in uncertainty and wondering if, like earlier this year, this is a prelude another round of arrests. Just two months after police brought down a slew of the most well-known dark web markets, those left standing can’t quite figure out — nor defeat — who has been behind a three-week long denial-of-service offensive that’s knocked their sites offline. As if looking to further stoke fear and uncertainty, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein recently spoke in Washington, D.C. on how the Department of Justice is continuing to target crime on the dark web. Deputy AG Rosenstein said today the DOJ is focusing in on dark net markets. pic.twitter.com/Ms4kvMdmAK — Patrick O’Neill (@HowellONeill) October 25, 2017 Paranoia haunts the mood of those who remain as many wait for the next looming law enforcement sting. Those actions have sown a deep distrust […]

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