dChan
Anonymous ID: 9381cf March 6, 2019, 5:34 p.m. No.5546847   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>6939

Microsoft : Iranian Hackers Have Hit Hundreds of Companies in Past Two Years – 2nd Update

 

Cyberattacks linked to Iranian hackers have targeted thousands of people at more than 200 companies over the past two years, Microsoft Corp. said, part of a wave of computer intrusions from the country that researchers say has hit businesses and government entities around the globe.

 

The campaign, the scope of which hadn't previously been reported, stole corporate secrets and wiped data from computers. It caused damages estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars in lost productivity and affected oil-and-gas companies, heavy-machinery manufacturers and international conglomerates in more than a half-dozen countries including Saudi Arabia, Germany, the U.K., India and the U.S., according to researchers at Microsoft, which deployed incident-response teams to some of the affected companies.

 

"These destructive attacks…are massively destabilizing events," said John Lambert, the head of Microsoft's Threat Intelligence Center.

 

Microsoft traced the attacks to a group it calls Holmium. It is one of several linked by other researchers over the past year to hackers in Iran, a country that many security researchers say aspires to join Russia and China as one of the world's premier cyber powers. Some of Holmium's hacking was done by a group that other security companies call APT33, Microsoft said.

 

Iran "denies any involvement in cyber crimes against any nation," said a spokesman for Iran's mission to the United Nations in an email. He called the cybersecurity research by Microsoft and other companies "essentially ads, not independent or academic studies," that should not be taken at face value.

 

While American and European companies have been hit, security researchers say the attacks from Iran have focused heavily on the Middle East.

 

But they say Iran's growing cyber strength poses a potential threat to the U.S. at a time of intensified tension between the two countries.

 

"They're definitely sharpening their skills and moving up their capabilities," said John Hultquist, director of intelligence analysis at the cybersecurity firm FireEye Inc. "When they turn their attention back to the United States, we may be surprised by how much more advanced they are."

 

One target hit by APT33 is Italian oil company Saipem SpA. A December attack wiped data and affected computer infrastructure at company facilities in the Middle East, India, Scotland and Italy, according to Saipem.

 

Microsoft has been tracking Holmium for nearly four years. Activity surged in late 2018, according to Microsoft and other companies following the group.

 

To date, Mr. Lambert and his researchers have seen Holmium target more than 2,200 people across about 200 organizations with phishing emails that, if clicked, can install code that steals information or wipes data from computers on the victim's network.

 

In a phishing email sent to a victim and viewed by The Wall Street Journal, Holmium attackers copied a legitimate job advertisement from a Saudi Arabian oil-and-gas company and sent it to a worker with oil-industry expertise. When clicked on, the email led to a website that then attempted to download malicious software onto the victim's computer.

 

https://www.marketscreener.com/MICROSOFT-CORPORATION-4835/news/Microsoft-Iranian-Hackers-Have-Hit-Hundreds-of-Companies-in-Past-Two-Years-2nd-Update-28123238/