Poland investigates suspected Iranian cyberattack day after hackers target US company Stryker

"Polish authorities announced they are investigating whether Iranian hackers are behind the

attempted attack on a major nuclear research facility.
The cyberattack unsuccessfully targeted the National Centre for Nuclear Research, which houses the country's only operating nuclear reactor, officials said. Polish digital minister Krzysztof Gawkowski said that "the first identifications of the entry vectors … are related to Iran,” while cautioning that the signals could be deliberate misdirection to hide the criminals’ true location." msn

Iran cuts internet as protesters plan more rallies

"Iranian authorities are enforcing an internet blackout after protests escalated in Tehran." AJ

Cloudflare Outage Sparks Global Internet Chaos

"THE CLOUDFLARE COLLAPSE BY NUMBERS: 

OUTAGE SEVERITY: - Global scope across ALL timezones - 11,000+ reports in USA (first hour) - 3,800+ reports in UK (first hour) - Multiple critical services failed simultaneously ERROR TYPES REPORTED: - HTTP 500 (Internal Server Error) 

Cloudflare, the world’s leading web infrastructure and security company, confirmed that it was experiencing a significant issue with its Global Network in the early hours of Tuesday morning, causing widespread outages across the internet. The problem has affected various services, including social media platform X, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, and the outage monitoring site Downdetector among many other sites and apps experiencing problems. Even some news sites, including Axios, appear to be completely unreachable as of this writing due to the Cloudflare outage — visitors are asked to “unblock” a Cloudflare address to proceed.
According to Cloudflare’s System Status page, the company is currently investigating the issue, which is causing HTTP 500 errors that impact the Cloudflare dashboard and API. These server-level errors indicate that the problem lies within Cloudflare’s infrastructure, rather than with individual websites or servers.? ZeroHedge

Starlink 'down across the entire front line' in Ukraine as internet service suffers global outage

"Starlink, the satellite internet service owned by Elon Musk, suffered a global outage on Sept. 15, the company announced on its official website.
The service has become vital for hospitals, schools, and front-line military units across Ukraine.
"Starlink is once again down across the entire front line," Ukraine's top drone warfare commander, Robert "Madyar" Brovdi, wrote on Telegram." KI

Thousands of Killed Ukrainian Troops Under Official Draft Age, Russian Hackers Reveal

"KillNet, a pro-Russian cyberactivist group famous for its DDoS attacks against digital

infrastructure of some NATO countries, previously revealed that it had hacked the Ukrainian general staff's database containing information on killed and missing Ukrainian servicemen.
Among 1.7million reported Ukrainian war casualties, many killed between August and November 2023 were just 19–24—younger than the official draft age of 25, according to documents obtained by the KillNet hacker group.
This age group is technically only eligible for service under contract—including the heavily advertised Ukrainian “sweet deal” program for those 18–24.
Earlier, the hacktivist group announced that it had hacked the Ukrainian general staff's database containing information on 1.7 million killed and missing Ukrainian servicemen.
The hackers shared a number of photos of deceased Ukrainian soldiers, their passports and military IDs, death certificates, and tags." Spuntik

USAID Censorship Scheme Exposed; Global Engagement Center Worked With UK Government And Media Firms To Deploy AI Tools

"America First Legal (AFL) released explosive new documents obtained through ongoing litigation against the U.S. Department of State’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), exposing a vast, government-backed censorship operation to silence Americans under the guise of “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and “malinformation.” 

The documents reveal a disturbing alliance between the GEC, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the British Foreign, Commonwealth, Development Office (FCDO), and media censorship organizations, all working in lock-step to manipulate public discourse, control media narratives, and suppress free speech.

The GEC, which was forced to shut down in December 2024, was designed to “combat foreign disinformation abroad.” However, through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, AFL uncovered that the GEC engaged in state-sponsored propaganda, repeatedly using willing participants from private media organizations. Further, AFL’s lawsuit against the GEC revealed that USAID had created an internal “Disinformation Primer” that explicitly praised private sector censorship strategies and recommended further censorship tactics.
The new documents released by AFL show: The GEC and USAID coordinated efforts to censor “COVID-19 misinformation” and counter “COVID-19 propaganda.”
The GEC collaborated with officials in the British Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office on disinformation efforts.
The GEC coordinated with private media censorship firms, including Poynter and NewsGuard, which provided samples of its Misinformation Fingerprints artificial intelligence (AI) tool, designed to identify and rate websites based on their perceived “misinformation.”
The House Small Business Committee found that Park Advisors received a GEC cooperative agreement award of more than $6 million. Park Advisors then distributed subawards to several companies, including NewsGuard, the Atlantic Council, and the Global Disinformation Index, a project funded by George Soros that generated lists of conservative websites it urged advertising companies to boycott. Together, these groups, not subject to international restrictions like GEC was, tested disinformation products, which led to the creation of the “Disinfo Cloud,” an unclassified platform used by the U.S. federal government, the European Union, the U.K. government, the Australian government, and the Estonian government “to counter adversarial propaganda and disinformation.”
Skibinski showed samples of the new GEC/U.S Cybercommand Testbed Pilot (Misinformation Fingerprints). This program utilized artificial intelligence and machine learning to monitor “misinformation.” The House Small Business Committee report details that “there was no firewall in place to ensure that Federal resources were not being used to develop and promote technologies that would have domestic impacts.” 

ZeroHedge

Musk Says "Massive Cyberattack" On X Originated "In The Ukraine Area"

"Elon Musk said that the 'massive cyberattack' on X had IP addresses "originating in the Ukraine area."
Elon Musk confirms that X was hit by a "massive cyberattack," stating that the attack was executed with "a lot of resources" and possibly carried out by a "coordinated group and/or a country."
Musk said his team is currently tracing the origin of the attack." ZeroHedge

China Hacks the U.S. Treasury

"On Monday, a report was released that a Chinese hacker gained access to the U.S. Treasury

Department. According to the report, this was a state-sponsored attack, and the hacker was affiliated with the Chinese government. Although the announcement was made on Monday, Fox News said officials learned about the breach on December 8..... the department explained that the hacker infiltrated Treasury's system through access to a key used by the vendor to secure a cloud-based service used to remotely provide technical support for Treasury Departmental Offices (DO) end users. With access to the stolen key, the threat actor was able to override the service’s security, remotely access certain Treasury DO user workstations, and access certain unclassified documents maintained by those users." PJM

A 9th telecoms firm has been hit by a massive Chinese espionage campaign

"A ninth U.S. telecoms firm has been confirmed to have been hacked as part of a sprawling

Chinese espionage campaign that gave officials in Beijing access to private texts and phone conversations of an unknown number of Americans, a top White House official said Friday.
Biden administration officials said this month that at least eight telecommunications companies, as well as dozens of nations, had been affected by the Chinese hacking blitz known as Salt Typhoon.
The update from Neuberger is the latest development in a massive hacking operation that has alarmed national security officials, exposed cybersecurity vulnerabilities in the private sector and laid bare China's hacking sophistication." MS

Russians deleted one of Ukraine's most restricted registers in recent cyberattack

"Denys Maliuska, former Ukrainian Minister of Justice, has explained that the deletion of

Ukrainian registers by the Russians in a recent cyberattack was not a significant problem, as backups were available and the data will be recovered soon.
The only exception to this was information from the State Register of Civil Status Records, one of the most restricted registers, which holds seemingly harmless data, such as birth and marriage records.
However, there is one piece of information that is strictly protected by law – the secret of adoption. This is not the first resource targeted by the Russians since the full-scale invasion began.
Previously, according to their claims, they [Russian hackers] focused on stealing information. This time they have not only stolen but also destroyed it. It's a shift in their behavior." Pravada

Ukrainian hackers paralyze Russian nuclear weapons manufacturer

"Ukrainian cyber specialists from HUR military intelligence and the hacker group BO Team reportedly paralyzed the operations of a Russian nuclear weapons institute by launching a cyberattack on its internet provider Vega." NV

Charles Schwab, Fidelity, Vanguard Face Outages During Market Crash

"As global fears sparked a massive sell-off in stocks and cryptocurrencies on Monday,

investors were left frustrated by outages at major brokerages...Reuters reports that online services at Charles Schwab and Fidelity Investments experienced significant issues on Monday, leaving many users unable to log into their accounts during a tumultuous trading session. The outages coincided with a day of heightened market volatility, as investors dumped risky assets amidst growing concerns about a potential U.S. recession." Breitbart

French cybercrime unit responds to doxxing of Israeli Olympic team

"The French Anti-Cybercrime Office (OFAC) has been tasked with removing the private information of Israeli athletes, which was leaked ahead of the Summer Olympic Games in Paris....the hacker group Zeus published personal data of the members of the Israeli delegation, including documents, personal photos, addresses, medical information, and information about military service. The hackers claimed they were revealing what Israeli soldiers are doing at the Olympics, according to Ynet. The incident was classified as doxxing – a malicious publication of private data online – and reported to Pharos, a French service for flagging illegally disseminated content. According to Israeli media, the hackers also tried to harass the athletes online." RT

Russia behind cyber-attack, says Ukraine's security service

"Ukraine says it has proof that Russian security services were involved in the cyber-attack that targeted businesses around the world earlier this week.

The country's security service, the SBU, said it had obtained data that points to a link with an attack on the nation's capital, Kiev, in December.
Ukrainian firms were among the first to report issues with malicious software on Tuesday, before the virus spread.
Moscow denied any involvement, adding that the allegations were "unfounded".
The virus, which disrupted IT systems across the globe, froze computers and demanded a ransom be paid in the digital currency Bitcoin, which is untraceable.
However, the attack also hit major Russian firms, leading some cyber security researchers to suggest that Moscow was not behind it.
But on Saturday, Ukraine's SBU said in a statement that - through data obtained from international anti-virus companies - it had established a connection with a previous attack involving the so-called Petya virus, which it alleges was not designed to secure ransom payments." BBC

"Largest IT Outage In History" Sparks Disruptions Worldwide

"Early Friday, a global IT outage caused by an issue with cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike

disrupted flights, banks, retailers, stock exchanges, 911 call centers, and media outlets. Experts say this could be one of the largest IT outages in modern history.
Bloomberg reported that CrowdStrike warned customers that its Falcon Sensor threat-monitoring product was the source of the chaos, causing Microsoft's Windows operating system to crash. There was no mention of what triggered the issue, and there were reports of disruptions in Microsoft's Azure cloud and 365 Office software." ZH

HUR cyberattack paralyzes Crimean Bridge traffic

"Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (HUR) is attacking Russia’s communications infrastructure in occupied Crimea. The source said that following yesterday’s damage to the infrastructure of local internet service providers, HUR cyber specialists are now targeting servers of Russian propaganda media, communication operators, and the registration and traffic control systems at the illegally constructed Crimean Bridge." UV

Zelenskyy dismisses head of Ukrainian Security Service's cybersecurity department

"Zelensky, President of Ukraine, has signed a decree about the dismissal of Illia Vitiuk from the office of the Head of the Cybersecurity Department of the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU), whose wife bought an apartment worth more than 20 million hryvnias (around US$516,000) during the war." Pravada

French state services hit by cyberattacks of 'unprecedented intensity'

"The latest cyberattack to hit France follows a warning from Attal's defense adviser just last

week that the Olympics games in July and European Parliament elections in June could be "significant targets".
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal's office said several state bodies were targeted but did not provide details.
"Many ministerial services were targeted" from Sunday "using familiar technical means but of unprecedented intensity," Attal's office said." France24

North Korea Cyber Hack Hits South Korea's chipmakers

"A North Korean cyberattack successfully infiltrated a strategic industry and lifted data that could help it overcome a technological blockade, an intelligence disclosure by the South said on Monday.

In a warning to South Korea's chipmakers and the wider semiconductor industry, the National Intelligence Service (NIS), Seoul's main spy agency, said at least two companies were targeted in the last three months. Hackers stole design drawings as well as photographs of equipment, the NIS said." MS

Solar Flares May Have Caused Massive Cellular Outages

"After a nationwide outage left tens of thousands of frustrated AT&T and Verizon customers without wireless cellphone service, many were left wondering what caused the interruption.

Faulty equipment? Hackers? Solar flares?

That last one caught the attention of scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration after two powerful solar flares billions of times stronger than a hydrogen bomb erupted from the sun Many people are also speculating the cell outages could have been the result of some type of cyberattack." IndianapolisStar