In Geneva last month, US President Joe Biden tried set some ground rules for his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
He said cyber attacks on critical infrastructure were “off limits”.
“I looked at him and said how would you feel if ransomware took on the pipelines from your oil fields? He said it would matter,” Mr Biden said,
He went on to say that if Russia violated these “basic norms” the US would retaliate.
The events of the last few days will test that claim.
On Monday, Bloomberg reported that Synnex, a third-party provider used by the Republican National Committee (RNC), had been breached last week.
In a statement, the RNC Chief of Staff Richard Walters said he did not believe the hackers had infiltrated its systems.
The “supply chain” hack (where a company that provides IT functions to many other companies is hacked) followed another large-scale attack that was revealed on Friday.
In a statement, the RNC Chief of Staff Richard Walters said he did not believe the hackers had infiltrated its systems.
The “supply chain” hack (where a company that provides IT functions to many other companies is hacked) followed another large-scale attack that was revealed on Friday.
This time ransomware was used to infiltrate IT company Kaseya and its clients. Early estimates suggests that hundreds of businesses had their data scrambled in the hack.
The attacks were different in style, but shared one crucial similarity. They were both linked to Russia.
REvil, a prolific, Russia-linked cybercrime syndicate, took credit for the attack revealed on Friday.
The hackers demanded $70 million to restore the affected businesses’ data.
The attempted hack on the RNC was reportedly undertaken by a group known as Cozy Bear. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because they were accused of breaching the Democratic National Committee in 2016.
They’ve also been linked to the huge SolarWinds hack that infiltrated a slew of government agencies – revealed in December.
On Tuesday Joe Biden told reporters that the Kaseya attack “appears to have caused minimal damage to US businesses, but we’re still gathering information”.
Source-BBC
