Дmitry Kiselyov:
Another scandal that's currently still gaining speed in the US is connected to the major US intelligence agency — the National Security Agency (NSA). This Monday, the New York Times reported that a year ago unknown hackers infiltrated the NSA network and stole secret programs for cyber break-ins.
The damage, as they say inside the NSA, it's far worse than from Snowden. Valentin Bogdanov delved deeply into the subject.
The US Department of Homeland Security is calling the Americans for a cyberwar with Russia. A virtual one, for now. Vesti Weekly got hold of a drill scenario that is currently being conducted in several hospitals in Illinois. The legend closely resembles the current situation shamelessly pointing out the details. It's Fall, 2017, the G7 Summit has just ended in Chicago.
The Ukrainian Conflict was the key topic of the discussion.
Two weeks later the Ukrainian special forces raided rebel territories uncontrolled by Kiev. It returned back from a coastal town of Shyrokyne possessing valuable intelligence. The commander also reported several recovered hard drives and handwritten journals refer to a plan identified only as "Lesnoy Pozhar". The virus Lesnoy Pozhar is considered by the authors of this military fantasy a retribution weapon of DPR. As a revenge for sanctions and for suspending humanitarian aid.
The FBI agents are incapable of opposing the threat.
The hackers have organized a mailout. The ones who open the letters activate viruses that target energetics and healthcare systems. MRI machines and infusion pumps go broken. The second wave of the cyber attack targets transportation. It fills the hospitals with the victims of car crashes. The doctors can't cope, so the people get evacuated.
All but two hospitals in the state of Illinois still do not have access to electronic medical records and other data files housed on shared drives. The alternative reality was embedded into the external.
According to the New York Times, the NSA itself has not been able to recover after a huge leakage for a year and a half. The hackers stole samples of a top-secret cyber weapon. They belonged to the group called The Shadow Brokers and were selling them online. One of the rogue programs was later used to create the infamous Petya virus. There's a new report suggesting that a breach of the NSA security might be worse than we expected.
The New York Times says the government is unable to say what's exactly going on.
Did the NSA leak or did it get hacked? Is the hacker still active? Three people were arrested and charged with leaking One of them, who used to work at home had Kaspersky Anti-virus installed on the computer that was leaking the data. In today's America, it can be almost considered a treason. The Russian developers were instantly accused of hacking. But the results of the internal investigation, conducted in the laboratory, showed that the leaking computer was infected and any skillful hacker could get access to the data.
Evgeny Kaspersky, CEO of Kaspersky Laboratory: "Our cooperation with the Russian law enforcement and the Russian government is no different from what we do in the other regions be in Europe, America, Asia or the rest of the world. We help the good guys fight the cyber criminals. We help them to defend themselves, and neither have nor ever will help them attack".
The employees of the center of cyber security of CIA also consider themselves "good guys" however, they don't need any help from the outside. The hacker unit in Langley, Virginia consists of 5 000 people — almost two regiments of the regular army of the United States.
Darrin Porcher, cyber-security expert: "Twenty years ago the wars were waged with jets, submarines, and machine-guns. Now we have cyber-wars that take the battle to the computer networks. Some countries hack the other ones, steal money and classified information. That's where the true battle goes. The battles of the past are no match for today's battles".
Despite that, the methods of warfare remain the same. The CIA had already mastered the tactics of conducting operations under a foreign flag while invading Cuba. Now it's used in cyberspace. The special code called "Hive" that helps conceal the CIA hacking programs making them appear as harmless allows the uniformed hackers to operate through the Internet.
According to WikiLeaks, they forged their lockpicks to resemble the Russian anti-virus. Three examples included in the source code build a fake certificate for the anti-virus company Kaspersky Laboratory, Moscow pretending to be signed by a company from Cape Town. In this way, if the target organization looks at the network traffic coming out of its network it's likely to misattribute the CIA exfiltration of data to uninvolved entities whose identities have been impersonated. The rule "make Russia a scapegoat" is now used not only by politicians but the intelligence agencies as well.
The Attorney General Jeff Sessions before beginning his speech in the Federalist Society in Support of Law and Public Policy just in case makes sure the former Russian ambassador that left Washington several months ago, is not present.
Jess Sessions, US Attorney General: "Is Ambassador Kislyak in the room? Any Russians? Anybody been to Russia? Or has some Russian cousins?"
Sessions could be understood — this week he had to explain in Congress the affiliations between Moscow and Trump's team. But he's preparing to strike back. Hillary can have her own Special Prosecutor Mueller as well. The US Department of Justice wants to take a close look at a purchase of Uranium One by Rosatom. Donald Trump and the Republican congressmen claim that the former Secretary of State could have violated the law, coordinating the deal. For the first time after her defeat, Hillary appeared in public with her husband Bill.
The conversation almost immediately steered towards the favorite subject:
"Putin is an internal threat to our democracy and a threat to our national security. The Russians wrecked havoc in America, and we were too weak to defend ourselves".
Her husband didn't remain silent as well. Bill Clinton suggested Trump think about his legacy and stop searching for enemies.
The US President responded on Twitter: "Hillary seems to be his number one adversary, no need for the others. Crooked Hillary Clinton is the worst (and biggest) loser of all time. She just can't stop, which is so good for the Republican Party. Hillary, get on with your life and give it another try in three years!"
Well, not everyone is ready to wait so long. Another group of Democrats introduced an impeachment resolution in Congress. There's a less extreme option as well. First time in 40 years since Gerald Ford the Senate discussed depriving the US President of his right to order a nuclear strike. Without the red button, any resident of the White House becomes a just temporary tenant.
Valentin Bogdanov, Ivan Utkin, and Denis Lisitsin Vesti Weekly, USA.
