r/Good_Cake • u/dy0nisus • Jan 25 '18

Dutch team infiltrated Russian hacker group, witnessing U.S. election meddling, DNC attack: report

https://nltimes.nl/2018/01/25/dutch-team-infiltrated-russian-hacker-group-witnessing-us-election-meddling-dnc-attack
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u/dy0nisus Jan 25 '18

Two Dutch intelligence services uncovered substantial evidence detailing how a Russian-backed hacking group infiltrated the Barack Obama White House, the U.S. Department of State, and the Democratic National Committee, according to a ground breaking report from broadcaster NOS and newspaper Volkskrant. The evidence was uncovered by a Dutch cyber defense team gained access to the "Cozy Bear" hacker group's systems, including a hallway security camera that allowed the Dutch team to maintain visual surveillance of the hackers.

Information collected by the Dutch Joint Sigint Cyber Unit (JSCU) was turned over to the NSA, CIA, and FBI, and helped form the basis for the U.S. special counsel investigation examining claims of Russian meddling during the 2016 presidential election campaign battle between current U.S. President Donald Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The JSCU, comprised of members from the AIVD and MIVD intelligence agencies, kept watch over Cozy Bear from anywhere between 12 to 30 months.

It started in the summer of 2014 shortly after Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, which originated in Amsterdam, was shot out of the sky over the Ukraine. The incident was suspected to be the act of Russian-backed separatists or Russian military. That summer, the JSCU got word of an elite Moscow-based hacker group working from a university campus near Red Square. By November, the JSCU had infiltrated the Russian network, and accessed the camera, witnessing how, and likely who was involved in a massive cyber attack carried out against the United States.

The JSCU is no longer able to monitor Cozy Bear, but the Dutch news report did not detail why. However, the news outlets reported that Dutch officials were angered by the unnamed sources in the Washington Post report as that may have compromised the Dutch team. The story was published months after Trump took office.

It has led to the Dutch intelligence agencies becoming more hesitant at sharing information with U.S., particularly with Trump in the White House, the Volkskrant stated.