Phishing Targets Individuals in Conflict-Business & Personal Affairs
The Economist June 13th 2020 pp51-52 Hacking “Basin Motives”. “Sleuths uncover a brazen case of cyber-mischief”
Companies are accustomed to daily cyberattacks. Recently, “CitizenLab, part of the Munk School of Government at the University of Toronto” claims to have identified a group of mercenary hackers “it dubbed ‘Dark Basin’” apparently run by Sumit Gupta leader of BellTroX. Although he was indicted along with some private investigators in 2015, Gupta claims only to perform professional services-companies pay to evaluate their cybersecurity.
Hackers typically use “Phishing”-they send ‘official looking” EMAILs that seek to have recipients enter sensitive usernames and passwords. Phishers target “company bosses, judges, journalists…etc. and ordinary people in the midst of a divorce in America, Mexico and elsewhere.”
What’s harder than trying to identify those responsible for hacking is trying to decipher who hires hackers. A couple of examples. Although, Exxon won a settlement in 2019, some believe they were behind the hacking of participants “in a campaign called ‘ExxonKnew’” who countered Exxon’s purported involvement “playing down the severity of climate change”. Journalists covering Wirecard were reportedly also targeted. Wirecard, a German payment-processing firm, is involved in an accounting scandal. These attacks targeted individuals within hedge funds short-selling Wirecard.
“’These kinds of services allow their clients to cause trouble from a distance, in a different jurisdiction, with minimal friction and not much chance of getting caught.’ Businesses-and anyone caught in a bad-tempered divorce-beware”.
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