Tag Archive for: israeli

Israeli Spy Drama ‘Trust No One’ Ups the Paranoia – Variety

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Yehuda Levi in

Amit Yasour

World-premiering at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival, Israeli espionage thriller “Trust No One” marries the pedigree and primetime polish of past series like “Traitor” and “Valley of Tears” with techno-anxieties tied to the here-and-now – specifically with regards to the security state and modern cyber warfare.

“Israel has become one of the largest global exporters of spy ware,” says co-creator Daniel Amsel. “Only, those technological weapons can undermine democracy and lead to the death of truth. So we wanted to thread those very sensitive topics into an entertaining and fast-paced thriller that deals with the loneliness of leadership and the difficulties of parenthood, among other themes.”

Created by Amsel alongside Ron Leshem (“Euphoria”) and Amit Cohen (“False Flag”), directed by Ofir Lobel (“A Wonderful Country,” “Black Space”), and distributed by Keshet International, the nine-part drama follows Itamar (“Fire Dance” award-winner Yehuda Levi), the youngest ever head of Israel’s Shin Bet security agency turned target of a cyber-security leak.

As promised by the title, the series ratchets up the paranoia scene-for-scene once Itamar finds himself alienated from (and suspicious of) the full security apparatus serving under him.

“Nobody’s spared in this age of AI, deep-fakes and all-powerful surveillance,” says Amsel. “Even if you’re surrounded by the most sophisticated defense system, nobody is safe. Not even the head of the biggest security agency in the Middle East.”

“We thought to explore how the most secretive people in the world react to a time when sharing has become our second nature and privacy no longer exists,” Amsel continues. “We have all willingly given up privacy in the name of comfort, and today every possible bit of date is but a few clicks away. That offers a fresh way into an intelligence agency drama, especially when you dive into the character’s point of view.”

“Trust No One”
Keshet

“Itamar is not some typical strong and macho Israeli who wins every battle and…

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Israel-Iran cyber warfare heats up, exploiting Israeli internal divide

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TEL AVIV – Foreign states and groups, primarily Iran, have been conducting for the past few years cyber campaigns designed to destabilize Israel and its institutions, with another such offensive exposed on Saturday. The latest campaign involved thousands of fake posts on Instagram revealing personal details of Israeli police officers and was disguised as an attack staged by Israel’s anti-government protesters.

One of the pro-democracy activists used to expose the police officers was Nitzan Weisberg, who suddenly recognized her picture on a profile disseminating information that she had not posted. The Fake Reporter, an Israeli watchdog that researches and exposes false information, was quick to tweet an alert about the scam. Still, the impact of the warning was limited. 

The affair made headlines only after Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir took the bait. Ben-Gvir ignored the warnings and instead treated the posts as authentic, accusing the protest movement of posting photos of police officers, along with their personal phone numbers, in order to intimidate them and prevent them from carrying out their duties. 

Israel and Iran are clearly in an undeclared state of war, but paradoxically, the interests of some groups on the opposing sides sometimes seem to overlap. As such, Ben-Gvir played into the hands of the false news campaign, fighting back as if these posts were real news and facts.

“This is a serious and dangerous crossing of a red line designed to harm the police officers and their families,” tweeted Ben-Gvir, chair of the Jewish Power party. 

Ben-Gvir also posted photos of a designated Telegram channel called “Bogdim” (“Traitors”), ostensibly devoted to exposing the police officers. However, according to the assessment of the Shin Bet security agency and the police, the minister was taken in by false information spread by a foreign state, probably by Iranian hackers. The profiles of the users allegedly exposing the police had been taken over by hackers and used to post the information.

Ben-Gvir, the hard-line nationalist in charge of the Israel Police, was not too bothered by the experts’ opinion. His tweet remained online, although he…

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Iranian Hackers Deploy New Ransomware Against Israeli Firms

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Cyberwarfare / Nation-State Attacks
,
Fraud Management & Cybercrime
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Ransomware

Researchers Discover Moneybird Ransomware Strain, Warn of Growing Sophistication

Anviksha More (AnvikshaMore) •
May 25, 2023    

Iranian Hackers Deploy New Ransomware Against Israeli Firms
Image: Shutterstock

Security researchers have discovered an Iran-linked APT group carrying out a new chain of ransomware attacks using a new strain of malware against Israeli organizations.

See Also: Live Webinar | Education Cybersecurity Best Practices: Devices, Ransomware, Budgets and Resources

Researchers at Check Point found a ransomware strain called Moneybird that is reminiscent of the Iranian Agrius group’s previous campaigns.

Agrius gained notoriety for targeting Israel-based entities with wiper variants, masking the intrusions as ransomware attacks to confuse defenders.

According to Check Point investigators, the new Moneybird strain is an upgrade to previous Agrius attacks that used its custom-built Apostle wiper malware. The upgrade is indicative of the group’s relentless expansion efforts. “The use of a new ransomware written in C++ is noteworthy as it demonstrates the group’s expanding capabilities and ongoing effort in developing new tools,” Check Point said.

The latest attack involves web shells positioned on vulnerable servers using known VPN service nodes, which are used as the entry point. Following the deployment of web shells, the threat actor used several publicly available tools to move laterally through the affected system.

The malicious files are then downloaded for ransomware execution and data exfiltration activities through some common services.

Other tools are also deployed for similar intentions, such as…

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Israeli Phone Malware Maker QuaDream Apparently Ready To Call It Quits After Suffering A Little Negative Press

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from the cut-and-run dept

QuaDream, an NSO-alike with links to Israeli intelligence services, first made international headlines last year. And for the worst reasons. An investigation found QuaDream (much like NSO Group) sold iPhone-targeting malware to human rights violators. These sales were given a layer of plausible deniability, handled by a Cyprus-based company on behalf of QuaDream as it collected paychecks from garbage governments around the world.

Further investigations by Toronto’s Citizen Lab uncovered QuaDream’s links to abusive governments, as well as abusive deployments of its zero-click exploit to target journalists, activists, political opponents, and dissidents.

Now that it’s inadvertently shown its whole ass to the world, it appears QuaDream is shuttering its malware business. Or at least, it wants all of its critics to believe that’s what it’s doing. But this report from the Jerusalem Post indicates that, real or otherwise, QuaDream’s latest business move involves laying off several actual human beings.

Israeli cybersecurity company QuaDream reportedly summoned many of its 40 employees to a pre-termination hearing on Monday ahead of widespread layoffs, according to Globes.

This downturn (and its unfortunate effect on 40 QuaDream employees) is being blamed on everything but the company’s decision to sell to human rights abusers, engage in zero oversight of its products’ deployment, and it’s willingness to engage in ethically awful business practices.

QuaDream, which can only access iPhones (unlike NSO, which can also hack Android phones), wrote in a letter to court: “The crisis in the industry began due to the public disclosure of the activities of some of the companies from 2018 onward, which resulted in the fact that in November 2011, the US Chamber of Commerce put NSO and Candiru on its blacklist. Immediately after that, at the start of 2022, the regulator in Israel decided to reduce the number of countries to which it is allowed to sell the companies’ products in the industry from 102 to only 37, which caused a severe economic crisis in the entire industry.”

When you’re blaming a government for harming your business by…

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