The US handed over Russian cybercriminals in a prisoner swap

Where was the Voter? How did Fowler find the voter database, and how did she discover it? A comparison of different approaches to identify data breaches

“There’s definitely progress on basic data security, and I don’t see stuff like this very often anymore,” Fowler says. The open internet and no specialized tools allowed me to find this. This is critical infrastructure that was exposed.

Fowler has found voter database in the past, which might be a low-level marketing outreach database that someone has purchased. “But here I saw voter applications— there were actually scans of documents, and then screenshots of online applications. I can see voter rolls for active voters, as well as those with military email addresses. When I saw Social Security numbers, driver license numbers, and death certificates, I felt like they should be out of sight.

The law requires that the notification be made to the state within 45 days of the incident. A standard version of a contract for technology services posted publicly requires that a contractor notify a county if they discover a data breach within 15 minutes.

Multiple Security Issues in Voter Registration Databases: a Public Response to a SIRI Detection of a Data Scanning Attempt

The notification was viewed by WIRED on Friday. Platinum stated that it has evidence of a claim the file storage containing voter registration documents may have been scanned. There was a thorough investigation done. There is no evidence of voter registration forms being leaked or stolen. We used this opportunity to deploy new and additional safeguards around voter registration documents.”

Fowler reported the databases to Platinum on July 18 but did not receive a response. As Fowler dug deeper into public records, he realized that Platinum works with the Illinois-based managed services provider Magenium, so he sent a disclosure to this company as well on July 19. Again, he says he did not receive a response, but shortly after the databases were secured, pulling them from public view. The two companies did not return WIRED’s requests for comment.

Fowler determined through public records that all of the counties seem to have a relationship with Platinum Technology Resource, a service that provides voter registration software and other digital tools along with ballot printing. Many counties in Illinois use Platinum Technology Resource as an election services provider, including DeKalb, which confirmed its relationship with Platinum to WIRED.

The threat to critical infrastructure is growing as state-backed hacking becomes more sophisticated and aggressive. Sometimes the biggest vulnerabilities are not software issues, but errors that leave the safe door open and the crown jewels exposed. After years of efforts to shore up election security across the United States, state and local awareness about cybersecurity issues has improved significantly. The findings reflect the reality that there are always more oversights to be found during an election.

There may be a lot of more data breeches if it seems that way. Part of this apparent spike is thanks to the growing popularity of infostealer malware. These types of malicious software are being used by the criminals to steal as much sensitive data as possible. That stolen data is then sold on criminal hacker forums, then used to break into victims’ accounts, which can include those of massive corporations. It is a good reason to always enable multi-factor on your device.

The WIRED Insider’s Dig: Privacy and Security News in the Near-Far-Right Decays of a Russian Cybercriminal

The history of confidential FBI informants is long and sordid—and ongoing. The WIRED investigation that was published this week shows how one person infiltrated the far-right and then passed their information to the Feds, who used it to encourage a new generation of violent extremists online.

For years, hacking computers with lasers has been a wealthy person’s game. Security researchers Sam Beaumont and Larry “Patch” Trowell are releasing an open source laser hacking tool called RayV Lite, which can be produced for just $500, a tiny fraction of the $150,000 price tag of laser equipment historically used for hardware hacking. The pair will talk about the RayV lite at the Black Hat conference next week. It’s going to be a busy week for WIRED, with Black Hat and Defcon happening in the same week in Vegas, so check back for our full coverage on Tuesday.

But that’s not all. We didn’t cover the privacy and security news in depth, so we round it up every week. The full stories can be found by clicking the headlines. Stay safe out there.

Source: US Hands Over Russian Cybercriminals in WSJ Reporter Prisoner Swap

US Hands Over Russian Cybercriminals in WSJ Reporter Prisoner Swap: The First Time the US Has Left a Prisoner Exchange

In a historic prisoner swap between the US and Russia, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former Marine Paul Whelan were freed from Russian detention on Thursday. The White House said there was a secret deal to swap prisoners between Russia and the West, which involved 16 prisoners in Russia who were moved to the West and eight in Russia. NBC News reports this is likely the first time the US has released international hackers in a prisoner exchange.

The two Russian hackers are Roman Seleznev and Vladislav Klyushin. Seleznev was sentenced in 2017 to 27 years in prison for racketeering convictions. According to the US Department of Justice, he installed malware on point-of-sale systems software that allowed him to steal millions of credit card numbers from more than 500 US businesses. In September 2023, Klyushin was sentenced to nine years in prison for what US prosecutors described as a “$93 million hack-to-trade conspiracy.”

Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, will pay $1.4 billion to settle a lawsuit brought by the Texas attorney general, whose office accused the social media behemoth of illegally capturing the biometric data of millions of Texans. In 2022, the state sued Meta over its implementation of a feature that used face recognition to automatically suggest people to tag in photos and videos uploaded to Facebook. The feature violated a Texas law that makes it illegal to capture and profit from someone’s fingerprints without their permission, prosecutors say. The Texas attorney general said that the settlement was the largest privacy settlement ever obtained by a state.

Source: US Hands Over Russian Cybercriminals in WSJ Reporter Prisoner Swap

A widespread microsoft azure outage caused by a distributed denial of service attack, and the case of a user in China

A widespread microsoft azure outage that impacted a number of services was caused by a cyberattack. The data shows the incident lasted about eight hours on Tuesday and affected a subset of customers globally.

The company said the attack was a distributed denial of service which was a malicious attempt by hackers to disrupt the operations of a target company. According to PCMag, two groups claim responsibility. Microsoft plans on publishing a review of the incident.