Here is a roundup of every cyberattack that made headlines in 2011 so far. As cybercriminals find new targets, expect the list to (unfortunately) grow.
On Feb. 24, Anonymous took down several websites associated with the controversial Westboro Baptist Church. A small but vocal Christian group that loves publicity and hates almost everything else, the Westboro Baptist Church pickets military funerals with signs reading "God Hates Fags" and "Thank God for Dead American Soldiers."
Feb. 22: Voice of America
On Feb. 22, pro-Iran hackers went after Voice of America the official news service of the United States government. This one was by a group calling itself the Iranian Cyber Army (ICA). In its hack on www.voanews.com, the ICA denounced what it saw as U.S. involvement in the ongoing revolutions in the Muslim world. The ICA manipulated the VOA homepage to read: “Mrs. Clinton Do you want to hear the voice of oppressed nations from heart of USA? Islamic world doesn’t believe USA trickery. We call on you to stop interfering in Islamic countries.”
Feb. 18: Canada
In mid-February, it was revealed that the Treasury Board, Finance Department and Defence Research and Development — Defence Research and Development Canada is a civilian military agency — were all breached in January by hackers believed to be operating in China. The hackers were seeking confidential information pertaining to financial and weapons information and data about oil and gas resources.
Feb 11: Iran
As antigovernment protests spread throughout the Middle East, so did cyberattacks aimed at crippling oppressive government regimes. On Feb. 11, Anonymous took action against several Iranian government websites, standing in solidarity against what it called in a press release “the chains of oppression, tyranny and torture.” The distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks were levied against the websites of IRNA, Iranian’s semi-official news agency, President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and Ayotollah Ali Khomenei, but none were entirely successful.
Feb 6: HBGary Federal
Anonymous was involved in this next hack, and this one added a bit of intrigue and espionage to the mix. On Feb. 5, Aaron Barr, chief executive of the Washington, D.C.-based security firm HBGary Federal, announced that he had unmasked the members of Anonymous, and would reveal their identities at a security conference later in the month. Wasting no time, Anonymous the following day took down the website of Barr’s company, hijacked Barr’s personal Twitter account and his boss’s LinkedIn profile, and posted more than 70,000 of Barr’s personal e-mails. In a brazen show of defiance, Anonymous even posted the dossier of secret Anonymous identities Barr was planning to make public. While Anonymous was just flexing its muscles, it turned out those 70,000 e-mails told a scandalous story of espionage and dastardly closed-door dealings. Barr’s leaked e-mails revealed that his company was planning to launch cyberattacks and public smear campaigns of its own against WikiLeaks.
Feb. 5: Nasdaq
Next up to go down: the Nasdaq. As reported in a Feb. 5 Wall Street Journal article, hackers for the past year had been targeting computer networks belonging to the Nasdaq stock exchange. But these online crooks weren’t after money. The hackers’ real target was Directors Desk, a cloud application owned by Nasdaq that stores financial records and reports for hundreds of Fortune 500 companies and more than 10,000 corporate board members.
Jan. 26: Utah, Michigan, Albania, Italy, the U.S. Army, etc.
A few weeks passed before another high-profile organization was targeted, but when the next hit came, it was a big one. In late January, a hacker hijacked more than a dozen top military, government and education websites. Among the hacker’s haul were the websites of the states of Utah and Michigan, the Italian government, the Albanian military, Singhania University in India and the U.S. Army’s Communications-Electronic Command (CECOM). The hacked websites were being sold for $55-$499 each on an underground market.
Jan 26: Egypt
On Jan. 26, Anonymous struck again, this time against Egypt’s official government websites. The attacks on the websites of the cabinet, Ministry of the Interior and Ministry of Communications and Information Technology were carried out after then-President Hosni Mubarak blocked citizens’ access to Twitter. Following Egypt’s five-day Internet blackout, Anonymous launched a second wave of digital protests, taking down sites in Egypt as well as in Yemen.
Jan 2: Tunisia
The first notable digital disruption of the year occurred just two days in, when the hacktivist group Anonymous launched massive DDoS attacks against at least eight Tunisian government websites. The DDoS takedowns were in response to the Tunisian government’s decision to block its citizens from accessing WikiLeaks. Protests in Tunisia kicked off a surge of antigovernment opposition that spread quickly throughout the Middle East.
What’s next?
Unfortunately for prominent organizations — and even worse for controversial ones — the year is still young, and if the first two months are any indication, there are most certainly plenty of cyberattacks still to come.
[securitynewsdaily]
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