|
"Operation Newscaster", as labelled by American firm ''iSIGHT Partners'' in 2014, is a cyber espionage covert operation directed at military and political figures using social networking, allegedly done by Iran. The operation has been described as "creative",〔 "long-term" and "unprecedented".〔 According to ''iSIGHT Partners'', it is "the most elaborate cyber espionage campaign using social engineering that has been uncovered to date from any nation". == ISight's perceptions == On 29 May 2014, Texas-based cyber espionage research firm ''iSIGHT Partners'' released a report, uncovering an operation it labels "Newscaster" since at-least 2011, has targeted at least 2,000 people in United States, Israel, Britain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.〔 The victims who are not identified in the document due to security reasons, are senior U.S. military and diplomatic personnel, congresspeople, journalists, lobbyists, think tankers and defense contractors, including a four-star admiral.〔〔 The firm couldn’t determine what data the hackers may have stolen.〔 According to the ''iSIGHT Partners'' report, hackers used 14 "elaborated fake" personas claiming to work in journalism, government, and defense contracting and were active in Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube and Blogger. To establish trust and credibility, the users fabricated a fictitious journalism website, ''NewsOnAir.org'', using content from the media like Associated Press, BBC, Reuters and populated their profiles with fictitious personal content. They then tried to befriend target victims and sent them "friendly messages" with Spear-phishing to steal email passwords and attacks and infecting them to a "not particularly sophisticated" malware for data exfiltration.〔〔 The report says ''NewsOnAir.org'' was registered in Tehran and likely hosted by an Iranian provider. The Persian language word "Parastoo" ((ペルシア語:پرستو); meaning ''swallow'') was used as a password for malware associated with the group, which appeared to work during business hours in Tehran〔 as they took Thursday and Friday off.〔 ''iSIGHT Partners'' could not confirm whether the hackers had ties to the Iranian government.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Operation Newscaster」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|