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Read the original New York Times story, it gives a lot more technical details on the hack than this one[0]. Assuming the Israeli and NYT accounts are to be beli

Read the original New York Times story, it gives a lot more technical details on the hack than this one[0]. Assuming the Israeli and NYT accounts are to be believed, this was a very deliberate hack. Israel watched in real-time as Kaspersky sent out searches for NSA codename programs on all computers with Kaspersky AV installed (this was related to the whole Duqu 2.0 intrusion into Kaspersky's network that Kaspersky blogged about 2 years ago). And the NSA tools were some of the files reeled in from those searches. That said, it's still extremely embarrassing. Why is someone from TAO taking this kind of work home? 0. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/10/technology/kaspersky-lab-israel-russia-hacking.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/10/technology/kaspersky-lab-...

StanislavPetrov 9y ago
>Assuming the Israeli and NYT accounts are to be believed, An assumption nobody who knows anything about history will make.
- sien 9y ago
  This shouldn't be modded down. Security services are completely unreliable and release these things for their own benefit. The question with this is why are the Israelis pushing this now? The NYT has a poor record on this stuff as does pretty much everyone. WMD.
dotancohen 9y ago
> Israel watched in real-time as Kaspersky sent out searches for NSA codename programs on all computers with Kaspersky AV installed That happened _after_ Kaspersky identified the "NSA codename programs" as malware. That is exactly what an anti-malware application should do: look for instances of known malware.
revelation 9y ago
It's the NYT for crying out sake! Unless you believe they have the knowledge on staff to do any sort of original reporting on this, this story is exactly what a "government official speaking on the condition of anonymity" has whispered to them. It's the fricking party line. It's right there in the article: The current and former government officials who described the episode spoke about it on condition of anonymity because of classification rules. There are two options here, obviously. Someone revealed actual classified information, in which case apparently multiple government workers committed a felony to tell the NYT about a story that is entirely flattering for the employer they just betrayed. Or, and given the incidence of "government officials .. spoke on the condition of anonymity" in NYT stories the far more likely option, the press office of the NSA called the NYT, whispered some dangerous words about "off the record" and then delivered the official press release that for some reason they just didn't get to put on NSA website just yet. This is the NYT writing a government press release into a bad thriller guided not by independently verified facts (how could you) but sheer ideology to fill in the gaps.

StanislavPetrov 9y ago

>Assuming the Israeli and NYT accounts are to be believed, An assumption nobody who knows anything about history will make.

sien 9y ago
This shouldn't be modded down. Security services are completely unreliable and release these things for their own benefit. The question with this is why are the Israelis pushing this now? The NYT has a poor record on this stuff as does pretty much everyone. WMD.

dotancohen 9y ago

> Israel watched in real-time as Kaspersky sent out searches for NSA codename programs on all computers with Kaspersky AV installed That happened _after_ Kaspersky identified the "NSA codename programs" as malware. That is exactly what an anti-malware application should do: look for instances of known malware.

revelation 9y ago

It's the NYT for crying out sake! Unless you believe they have the knowledge on staff to do any sort of original reporting on this, this story is exactly what a "government official speaking on the condition of anonymity" has whispered to them. It's the fricking party line. It's right there in the article: The current and former government officials who described the episode spoke about it on condition of anonymity because of classification rules. There are two options here, obviously. Someone revealed actual classified information, in which case apparently multiple government workers committed a felony to tell the NYT about a story that is entirely flattering for the employer they just betrayed. Or, and given the incidence of "government officials .. spoke on the condition of anonymity" in NYT stories the far more likely option, the press office of the NSA called the NYT, whispered some dangerous words about "off the record" and then delivered the official press release that for some reason they just didn't get to put on NSA website just yet. This is the NYT writing a government press release into a bad thriller guided not by independently verified facts (how could you) but sheer ideology to fill in the gaps.