Documents leaked by Edward Snowden seem to confirm that hacking tools leaked earlier this week belong to the US National Security Service (NSA).
The "Shadow Brokers" team published a series of malware and the tools used by a hacking group known as the “Equation Group.” Shadow Brokers describes malware as “cyberweapons” used by NSA to conducttreatment actions surveillance.
On the other hand Intercept, which still has copies of documents leaked by Edward Snowden, reported on Friday that there are indications linking hacking tools with the NSA.
One of the top-secret slides used by the NSA showing how one might use one of the leaked malware "weapons" uses a string of 16 characters. THE codeς “ace02468bdf13579,” βρέθηκε και στα προγράμματα που διέρρευσαν. Η συγκεκριμένη εφαρμογή ονομάζεται SECONDDATE, και περιγράφεται σαν ένα εργαλείο “που είναι σχεδιασμένο να υποκλέπτει αιτήματα web και να κατευθύνει τους browsers των υπολογιστών-στόχων σε ένα web server της NSA.”
What still remains unknown is how the Shadow Brokers managed to discover the server with the malware. The tools are highly effective, and specialized malware is designed to penetrate some of the best firewalls and latest technology equipment networking in the world.
Cisco and Fortinet, both of whom have confirmed that their products are affected by malware, have already begun repairing their devices and technology.
As we mentioned in a previous publication, Snowden had said on Twitter that "hacking an NSA malware server is not simple."
Snowden has pretty much suggested that Russia, where he currently lives in exile, may have been behind the leak.
"This leak looks like someone is sending a message and that escalating the game could get dirty pretty quickly."
It seems we are already there.
Picture of theintercept.com
