Tag: Scientists | Page 2

Exclusive: Russian hackers targeted U.S. nuclear scientists

January 6, 2023/in Computer Security

LONDON/WASHINGTON, Jan 6 (Reuters) – A Russian hacking team known as Cold River targeted three nuclear research laboratories in the United States this past summer, according to internet records reviewed by Reuters and five cyber security experts.

Between August and September, as President Vladimir Putin indicated Russia would be willing to use nuclear weapons to defend its territory, Cold River targeted the Brookhaven (BNL), Argonne (ANL) and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories (LLNL), according to internet records that showed the hackers creating fake login pages for each institution and emailing nuclear scientists in a bid to make them reveal their passwords.

Reuters was unable to determine why the labs were targeted or if any attempted intrusion was successful. A BNL spokesperson declined to comment. LLNL did not respond to a request for comment. An ANL spokesperson referred questions to the U.S. Department of Energy, which declined to comment.

Cold River has escalated its hacking campaign against Kyiv’s allies since the invasion of Ukraine, according to cybersecurity researchers and western government officials. The digital blitz against the U.S. labs occurred as U.N. experts entered Russian-controlled Ukrainian territory to inspect Europe’s biggest atomic power plant and assess the risk of what both sides said could be a devastating radiation disaster amid heavy shelling nearby.

Cold River, which first appeared on the radar of intelligence professionals after targeting Britain’s foreign office in 2016, has been involved in dozens of other high-profile hacking incidents in recent years, according to interviews with nine cybersecurity firms. Reuters traced email accounts used in its hacking operations between 2015 and 2020 to an IT worker in the Russian city of Syktyvkar.

“This is one of the most important hacking groups you’ve never heard of,” said Adam Meyers, senior vice president of intelligence at U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. “They are involved in directly supporting Kremlin information operations.”

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), the domestic security agency that also conducts espionage campaigns for Moscow, and Russia’s embassy in Washington did not…

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Chicago scientists are testing an unhackable quantum internet in their basement closet

October 10, 2022/in Internet Security

A picture of Thomas the Tank Engine is displayed on a piece of equipment in the quantum computing lab at the University of Chicago’s Eckhardt Research Center on Oct. 4, 2022. (Taylor Glascock/for The Washington Post)

CHICAGO — The secret to a more secure and powerful internet — one potentially impossible to hack — might be residing in a basement closet seemingly suited for brooms and mops.

The 3-foot-wide cubby, in the bowels of a University of Chicago laboratory, contains a slim rack of hardware discreetly firing quantum particles into a fiber-optic network. The goal: to use nature’s smallest objects to share information under encryption that cannot be broken — and eventually to connect a network of quantum computers capable of herculean calculations.

The modest trappings of Equipment Closet LL211A belie the importance of a project at the forefront of one of the world’s hottest technology competitions. The United States, China and others are vying to harness the bizarre properties of quantum particles to process information in powerful new ways — technology that could confer major economic and national-security benefits to the countries that dominate it.

Quantum research is so important to the future of the internet that it is drawing new federal funding, including from the recently adopted Chips and Science Act. That’s because, if it pans out, the quantum internet could safeguard financial transactions and health care data, prevent identity theft and stop hostile state hackers in their tracks.

Just this past week, three physicists shared the Nobel Prize for quantum research that helped pave the way for this future internet.

Quantum research still has plenty of obstacles to overcome before it reaches widespread use. But banks, health-care companies and others are starting to run experiments on the quantum internet. Some industries are also tinkering with early stage quantum computers to see whether they might eventually crack problems that current computers can’t, such…

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Iran indicts 14 for scientist’s killing

September 27, 2022/in Internet Security

None of the suspects names or nationalities were revealed, although the Islamic Republic continues to blame Israel for the assassination of Dr. Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

By Erin Viner

Tehran’s Attorney-General Ali Salehi has announced that indictments have been issued “14 persons” involved in the that the Islamic Republic has attributed to Israel.

The individuals have been charged with “corruption on the earth,” “involvement in intelligence and espionage cooperation with the Zionist regime,” “collusion with the purpose of undermining the security of the country,” and “action against national security,” the Tehran Times cited the top prosecutor as saying.

Fakhrizadeh, who was considered the father of Iran’s nuclear program, served as Iran’s Deputy Defense Minister after having been a General in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and earned a Ph.D. in nuclear physics. He was killed in a multi-pronged terrorist attack on 27 November 2020 while driving with his wife to their country home just outside Tehran.

Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani has publicly blamed on “terrorists from the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO/MEK), Jerusalem and the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency. Other Ayatollah Regime officials have at various times accused Western intelligence operatives or Saudi Arabia with involvement in the attack.

The Islamic Republic has long threatened to avenge Fakhrizadeh’s killing.

In September 2021, the New York Times has published a report alleging that Israel assassinated the senior nuclear scientist with a state-of-the-art remotely controlled “killer robot.”

According to the article, Israel had held Fakhrizadeh in its sights for at least 14 years as part of its ongoing campaign to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. The following year, the paper said that then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert played a recording in Jerusalem for visiting-President George W. Bush of what 3 people who heard the tape said was Fakhrizadeh speaking “explicitly about his ongoing effort to develop a nuclear warhead.” While exposing a secret Iranian nuclear…

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Voting security advocates, computer scientists sound alarm over new R.I. voting law

August 19, 2022/in Computer Security

MS-0819voting-02 — Rob Rock, state elections director, with machines used at voting places around the state.
PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO

Once a common office fixture, fax machines have been reduced to a rare, if novelty, relic. Unless, of course, you’re a military member or overseas resident who wants to vote in a Rhode Island election. The good, old-fashioned fax machine has long been the only alternative to sluggish snail mail for overseas and military voters…

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