US intelligence and law enforcement agencies on Tuesday said that Russia was probably behind the massive SolarWinds hack that has shaken government and corporate security, contradicting US President Donald Trump, who had said that China could be to blame.
A joint statement by the FBI, the US Directorate of National Intelligence, the US National Security Agency and the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) outlined their findings in what experts have called the most devastating break in US computer security in years.
Their investigation “indicates that an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor, likely Russian in origin, is responsible for most or all of the recently discovered, ongoing cyber compromises of both government and non-governmental networks,” they wrote.
Trump, who over four years has avoided criticizing Moscow, has refused to finger Russia in the case.
“Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens,” he tweeted about the hack last month, adding that the media were, “for mostly financial reasons, petrified of discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!).”
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-US attorney general Bill Barr have pointed to Moscow as the culprits.
CISA said that the hack was focused on the Orion security software produced by the US firm SolarWinds, widely found in government and private-sector computers across the globe.
About 18,000 public and private customers of SolarWinds would be vulnerable to the hack, the statement said.
However, it said that out of that number, “a much smaller number have been compromised by follow-on activity on their systems.”
So far investigators have found less than 10 US government agencies whose systems were compromised, the statement said.
The statement did not identify which agencies, but some have admitted they were targets, including the Department of the Treasury, the National Institutes of Health, and the departments of commerce, homeland security and defense.
The intrusion, which began early last year, only became public last month, revealed by private security consultants.
It sparked concerns that those behind it could have been able to access highly classified government secrets.
The three agencies said that they believe the hack “was, and continues to be, an intelligence gathering effort,” rather than an effort to steal corporate secrets or wreak damage on information technology systems.
“This is a serious compromise that will require a sustained and dedicated effort to remediate,” they said.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS