[iwar] Microsoft attack update
From: Fred Cohen
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Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 17:55:04 -0800 (PST)
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Subject: [iwar] Microsoft attack update
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>From UPI comes this report from after 6pm this evening.
Neal S.
Report: Russian agents likely have Microsoft codes
Sunday, 29 October 2000 18:17 (ET)
LONDON, Oct. 29 (UPI) -- Valuable source codes assumed stolen from
Microsoft's computer network last week by hackers believed to be based in
Russia likely are already in the hands of eavesdropping agents from Moscow's
primary intelligence agency, a British newspaper reported Sunday.
While the FBI continues to investigate the intrusion that caused a stir in
the U.S. technology security sector, some computer analysts told the Daily
Express that the source codes that the hackers presumably copied were most
likely again copied by eavesdropping agents of the Federal Security Service
(FSB).
The FSB, the successor to the dreaded Soviet KGB, has access to the
easily-tapped telephone lines of St. Petersburg, the Russian city where the
still unidentified hackers were believed to headquartered.
"The whole telephone network in St Petersburg was configured to ensure that
the KGB had access to everything passing through the lines, so they will
have a copy of these source codes somewhere," a computer security specialist
who was not identified told the newspaper. "Whether they are going to keep
them, or whether the material will find its way into the hands of criminal
gangs is unclear."
While Seattle-based Microsoft has maintained that the integrity of its
source codes -- the electronic blueprint for the company's nearly ubiquitous
software products -- was not damaged, most analysts believe the codes were
at the very least copied for bootlegging purposes, or to
be study so that security flaws can be found that would make more damaging
intrusions down the road possible.
The chances that the FSB intercepted the source codes as they were e-mailed
by the hackers to St. Petersburg were fairly high -- due to the fact that
the agency, much like the FBI, conducts both counterintelligence and
anti-organized crime activities.
The Daily Express said that Russian mafia gangs have developed an
aggressive hacking operation aimed at silently and stealthily stealing from
western nations by computer. Some crews even place "help-wanted" ads in
newspapers for recent graduates of Russia's computer schools.
"These are very young, extremely intelligent computer experts who are
committing these crimes," a law enforcement agent told the newspaper. "They
are highly organized and cover their tracks very well by using a
complicated network of people and computers. With the poor economy in
Russia, it is not surprising that they see the wealth in Europe and want
some of that."
Officials at banks and other major companies in Europe have come to
consider the growing corps of Russian hackers as one of their most serious
security concerns.
Copyright 2000 by United Press International
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