A team που ονομάζεται Shadow Brokers είχε διαρρεύσει το 2017 ένα σύνολο από εργαλεία hacking, που οδήγησαν σε τεράστιες παραβιάσεις security around the world, including ransomware WannaCry attacks.
The team he claimed to have stolen the tools by the US National Security Service (NSA), but it was a mystery in exactly what way were found in their hands. Now one Symantec's report revealed that the source might have been Chinese agents who took the tools while the NSA attacked their computers.
Symantec found that the Buckeye group (code name for a Guangzhou-based contractor working for the Chinese State Security Ministry) used the stolen NSA tools at least a year before Shadow Brokers leaked. Symantec believes the Buckeye group has taken the tools during an NSA attack and then used them to build their own version.
And it is easy for the Buckeye group to be able to get the tools out, since according to one an article by The New York Times, the NSA considers the group one of the most dangerous. The Buckeye group was tasked with attacking American manufacturers technology space and to satellite and nuclear propulsion manufacturers.
If the source of the Shadow Broker was Buckeye, then this group was also indirectly responsible for the attacks by the North Koreans and the Russian hackers who used the reformed tools to attack. The North Koreans struck the UK National Health Service and influenced vaccine supplies and Russian hackers have suppressed critical Ukrainian services, including the postal system, airports and ATMs.
Eric Chien, a security consultant at Symantec, told The New York Times that it is now time for America to seriously consider the possibility that its adversaries could capture and reformat America's hacking tools when they carry out attacks. In short, enemies of the American state can use these tools, paid for by American taxpayers, to attack US networks and infrastructure.
However, Symantec has found no evidence that the Buckeye team used the NSA tools against the NSA. The company believes that logically the team thought the NSA would have already developed defense against its own weapons.
