Shallow penetration

What is known and what is not known about the political activity of Russian hackers

In recent days, reports of hackers (both successful and not very) have become more frequent to gain access to non -public correspondence of European and American politicians. The publications of the Western media indicate that these hackers are connected with Russia, but the information is so incomplete and fragmentary that it is not clear even - these are still Russian hackers or hackers acting by order of Russia. Medusa gathered that it is also known about attempts to hack computers of American and European officials.

What is known

Recently, attacks about the attacks have become more frequent. It is impossible to say that there are more attacks themselves-firstly, many of them can be secret; Secondly, the media often receive information about attempts to hack a few months after the hacker attacks themselves. At the end of last week, The New York Times reported that Russian hackers gained access to part of Barack Obama correspondence, and The Wall Street Journal spoke about the Russians' attempt to penetrate the Pentagon network. In mid -April, Bloomberg learned that hackers related to Russia tried to receive information about the negotiations of the United States with another country (which is unknown), which were devoted to sanctions. At the beginning of the same month, CNN reported that the crackers gained access to the Obama schedule. Finally, in Finland they discovered the prime minister’s correspondence on sanctions against Russia; True, nothing was reported about the involvement of Russian hackers.

The name of the hackers group. The publication of Bloomberg says that hackers from the APT28 group tried to get information (Advanced Persistent Threat 28). In October 2014, Fireeye, which protects information on the Internet, wrote about it back in October 2014. APT28 allegedly has been working since 2007 and in recent years has tried to attack a huge number of different departments - from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Hungary to NATO. Evidence of its involvement in Russia is indirect - Fireye suggests that hackers are connected with Russia, as this is evidenced by attack objects, the distribution of activity in the time of day (hackers work when a working day in Russia) and the like.

What is unknown

What successes did hackers achieve. The press, which wrote about the attempts of hacks, says that the hackers could not get the information that interests them, or got acquainted with non -public correspondence, which, however, is not a secret in nature. Nevertheless, it is not known how many attacks did not write the media (in many cases, publications are based on information from anonymous sources) and what successes were actually added by hackers. In many cases, the crackers tried to cover the traces - it is possible that several times they succeeded and non -public information is already with them, although the objects of attacks do not know this.

How close hackers are associated with Russia. Press Secretary of President Vladimir Putin Dmitry Peskov information about the connection of APT28 with Russia refuted . But even if we assume that part of the attacks were made APT28, it is not known exactly who finances this group, for example, whether she receives money directly from the state budget and if so, who is responsible for its actions in the government and the Kremlin. It is not clear whether APT28 is trying to access secure files or attacks go in parallel and from several places. Earlier, the information that the White House was actively attacked by hackers from China, and the Chinese attacks are supposedly more , but the Russian ones were better organized. Could Chinese and Russian hackers join forces or, at least, begin to cooperate?