The hacking, which began in March, is said to have affected a dozen US government agencies, in a “spy operation” and not an attempt to sabotage infrastructure.
The World with AFP
Moscow is in the sights of the United States. The American intelligence services concluded, Tuesday, January 5, that Russia is “probably” at the origin of the gigantic cyberattack detected in December in the country.
The FBI (federal police), the management Intelligence Agency, the NSA military agency and the US agency in charge of cybersecurity and infrastructure security (Cisa), thus contradict Donald Trump who accused China of being at the origin of this intrusion into software from the US government and thousands of private companies.
The investigation concluded that an “adversary, possibly of Russian origin, is responsible for most of the recently discovered intrusions into government computer networks and non-governmental, “say the four intelligence services in a joint statement. “At this stage, we think it was and still is a spy operation” and not an attempt to sabotage infrastructure, they add. “We are taking all necessary steps to assess and respond to the scale of this transaction.”
The The attack began in March, with hackers taking advantage of an update to monitoring software developed by a Texas company, SolarWinds, used by tens of thousands of businesses and governments around the world. It continued for months before being discovered in December by the computer security group FireEye, itself the victim of cyberattacks.
“Unacceptable” actions
SolarWinds a reported that as many as 18,000 customers, including large corporations and US government agencies, had downloaded software updates, allowing hackers access to email exchanges. But according to intelligence services, “the number of compromised entities is much lower” than 18,000. “We have only identified a dozen government agencies” whose systems have been hacked, the statement added.
The intelligence services did not specify which agencies had been affected, but several ministries have already reported intrusions, including the State Department, the Foreign Trade Department, the Treasury, or the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Before Mr. Trump expressed doubts about Russia’s guilt, the US diplomat Mike Pompeo had pointed the finger at Moscow, but US intelligence had so far refrained from naming a culprit.
“It is unfortunate that it took more than three weeks in this administration (…) to finally publish a vague accusation “, commented Democrat Mark Warner, vice-president of the Senate Intelligence Committee. “I hope that we will soon have something more emphatic,” he said, adding that Russia should be warned that these actions are “unacceptable and will receive a response on an appropriate scale”. Russia has denied any involvement in the hacking.