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FBI is fighting back against Judge's Order to reveal TOR Exploit Code

FBI is fighting back against Judge's Order to reveal TOR Exploit Code

Mar 29, 2016
Last month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was ordered to reveal the complete source code for the TOR exploit it used to hack visitors of the world's largest dark web child pornography site, PlayPen. Robert J. Bryan, the federal judge, ordered the FBI to hand over the TOR browser exploit code so that defence could better understand how the agency hacked over 1,000 computers and if the evidence gathered was covered under the scope of the warrant. Now, the FBI is pushing back against the federal judge's order. On Monday, the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI filed a sealed motion asking the judge to reconsider its ruling, saying revealing the exploit used to bypass the Tor Browser protections is not necessary for the defense and other cases. In previous filings, the defence has argued that the offensive operation used in the case was " gross misconduct by government and law enforcement agencies, " and that the Network Investigative Technique (NIT)
Judge Confirms Government Paid CMU Scientists to Hack Tor Users for FBI

Judge Confirms Government Paid CMU Scientists to Hack Tor Users for FBI

Feb 25, 2016
Everything is now crystal clear: The security researchers from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) were hired by the federal officials to discover a technique that could help the FBI Unmask Tor users and Reveal their IP addresses as part of a criminal investigation. Yes, a federal judge in Washington has recently confirmed that the computer scientists at CMU's Software Engineering Institute (SEI) were indeed behind a hack of the TOR project in 2014, according to court documents [ PDF ] filed Tuesday. In November 2015, The Hacker News reported that Tor Project Director Roger Dingledine accused the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of paying the CMU, at least, $1 Million for providing information that led to the criminal suspects identification on the Dark Web . After this news had broken, the FBI denied the claims , saying "The allegation that we paid [CMU] $1 Million to hack into TOR is inaccurate."  Meanwhile, the CMU also published a press
Making Sense of Operational Technology Attacks: The Past, Present, and Future

Making Sense of Operational Technology Attacks: The Past, Present, and Future

Mar 21, 2024Operational Technology / SCADA Security
When you read reports about cyber-attacks affecting operational technology (OT), it's easy to get caught up in the hype and assume every single one is sophisticated. But are OT environments all over the world really besieged by a constant barrage of complex cyber-attacks? Answering that would require breaking down the different types of OT cyber-attacks and then looking back on all the historical attacks to see how those types compare.  The Types of OT Cyber-Attacks Over the past few decades, there has been a growing awareness of the need for improved cybersecurity practices in IT's lesser-known counterpart, OT. In fact, the lines of what constitutes a cyber-attack on OT have never been well defined, and if anything, they have further blurred over time. Therefore, we'd like to begin this post with a discussion around the ways in which cyber-attacks can either target or just simply impact OT, and why it might be important for us to make the distinction going forward. Figure 1 The Pu
How Spies Could Unmask Tor Users without Cracking Encryption

How Spies Could Unmask Tor Users without Cracking Encryption

Aug 01, 2015
T he O nion R outer (Tor) is weeping Badly! Yes, Tor browser is in danger of being caught once again by the people commonly known as " Spies ," who's one and only intention is to intrude into others' network and gather information. A team of security researchers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have developed digital attacks that can be used to unmask Tor hidden services in the Deep Web with a high degree of accuracy. The Tor network is being used by journalists, hackers, citizens living under repressive regimes as well as criminals to surf the Internet anonymously. A plethora of nodes and relays in Tor network is used to mask its users and make tracking very difficult. Any user when connects to Tor, the connection gets encrypted and routed through a path called a "circuit ." The request first reaches an entry node, also known as a ' Guard ' that knows the actual IP address of the user, and then goes through every ho
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Automated remediation solutions are crucial for security

websiteWing SecurityShadow IT / SaaS Security
Especially when it comes to securing employees' SaaS usage, don't settle for a longer to-do list. Auto-remediation is key to achieving SaaS security.
How Hacking Team and FBI planned to Unmask A Tor User

How Hacking Team and FBI planned to Unmask A Tor User

Jul 15, 2015
The huge cache of internal files recently leaked from the controversial Italian surveillance software company Hacking Team has now revealed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) purchased surveillance software from the company. The leaked documents contains more than 1 Million internal emails, including emails from FBI agent who wanted to unmask the identity of a user of Tor , the encrypted anonymizing network widely used by activists to keep their identities safe, but also used to host criminal activities. Unmasking Tor User In September last year, an FBI agent asked Hacking Team if the latest version of its Remote Control System (RCS), also known as Galileo - for which the company is famous for, would be capable to reveal the True IP address of a Tor user. The FBI agent only had the proxy IP address of the target, as according to FBI, the target may be using Tor Browser Bundle (TBB) or some other variant. So, the agent wanted to infect the target
Attackers Compromise TOR Network to De-Anonymize Users of Hidden Services

Attackers Compromise TOR Network to De-Anonymize Users of Hidden Services

Jul 30, 2014
A critical vulnerability in Tor — an encrypted anonymizing network considered to be one of the most privacy oriented service, which is used by online users in order to hide their activities from law enforcement, government censors and others — was probably being used to de-anonymize the identity of Tor users, Tor project warned on Wednesday. 115 MALICIOUS ToR RELAYS WERE DE-ANONYMIZING USERS According to a security advisory , Tor Team has found a group of 115 malicious fast non-exit relays (6.4% of whole Tor network), those were actively monitoring the relays on both ends of a Tor circuit in an effort to de-anonymize users. " While we don't know when they started doing the attack, users who operated or accessed hidden services from early February through July 4 should assume they were affected, " Tor said. When you use Tor anonymizing network, your IP address remains hidden and it appears that your connection is coming from the IP address of a Tor exit rela
Russian Government Offers $111,000 For Cracking Tor Anonymity Network

Russian Government Offers $111,000 For Cracking Tor Anonymity Network

Jul 26, 2014
The Russian government is offering almost 4 million ruble which is approximately equal to $111,000 to the one who can devise a reliable technology to decrypt data sent over the Tor , an encrypted anonymizing network used by online users in order to hide their activities from law enforcement, government censors, and others. The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) issued a notice on its official procurement website, originally posted on July 11, under the title " шифр «ТОР (Флот)» " ;which translates as " cipher 'TOR' (Navy) " an open call for Tor-cracking proposals whose winner will be chosen by August 20. The MIA specifically wants researchers to " study the possibility of obtaining technical information about users and users' equipment on the Tor anonymous network, " according to a translated version of the Russian government's proposal. Only Russian nationals and companies are allowed to take part in the competition " in o
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