Security News Bites for the Week Ending June 30, 2023
Ex-FBI Employee Sentenced to 46 Months for Taking Classified Docs Home
In a case similar to the one that an ex-president is facing, ex-FBI agent Kendra Kingsbury was sentenced on two counts of unlawfully retaining documents related to national defense. She held a Top Secret/SCI security clearance and the DoJ says that she removed 386 classified documents to her home, including sensitive national security information. This is not great for the ex-president. Credit: The Register
Europol Arrests 6500 Crooks and $900 Million in Proceeds from EncroChat Takedown
Sometimes it takes the cops awhile, but they can be persistent. EncroChat was an encrypted phone and communications network, supposedly police proof, used by crooks to deal drugs, negotiate murder for hire and other nice things. Turns out it wasn’t so police proof, but it did take the cops years to go through 115 million messages. But it worked. They arrested 6,558 people, confiscated 739 Euros of case, 30 million pills, 103 tons of cocaine, 971 vehicles and more. I would call this a win. Credit: The Hacker News
Shady Chinese Encryption Chips Used by Navy, NATO and NASA
The feds say that encryption chip maker Hualan has ties to the Chinese military and back in 2021 the Commerce Department added them to the “Entity List”, a list of companies on the U.S’s “naughty list”. Still, two years later, the company is still providing chips for Western encrypted hard disk drives that a wide variety of government (and private) entities are likely buying. Being on the entity list means that U.S. companies can’t sell to them, but, apparently, it does not restrict them from buying from them. That should be fixed pronto. Credit: Wired
TikTok Lied to Congress – Who Would Have Guessed
TikTok’s CEO testified to Congress, under oath, that U.S. users’ data was stored in the U.S. and Singapore. Now, Forbes has done some research and discovered this is actually a lie. Very sensitive U.S. users’ data, including social security numbers and bank account information is stored in China. Since lawyers are very practiced at “bending the truth”, they responded that they only answered the question about where the data that they stole off your phone was stored, not where other data that you voluntarily gave them was stored. This will not help their case in Congress. Credit: Forbes
Two Hacking Groups Claim Hack of Russian SatCom Provider
Dozor-Teleport, the company that is the satellite provider for power line companies, oil fields, parts of the Russian military and the Federal Security Service (FSB) among other Russian companies, is off the Internet. Two groups are claiming responsibility – Wagner and an unknown hacktivist organization. The claim of Wagner being responsible could be a disinformation campaign. What is true is that Dozor has a problem. Credit: Cyberscoop
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