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US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

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Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#301

Post by l33t2328 »

peteretep wrote: post #97
ackbar03 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol this was my first reaction as well, they now have a nation-state on their ass. But that being said its not impossible that this was just a cover for a Russian state-sponsored attempt on US infra

"nation-state" is not just a fancy infosec word for country, and there's some debate as to whether the USA constitutes an actual nation state, rather than a state.

The USA is absolutely a nation state. Cocal-cola, mcdonalds, Christmas, enlgish, etc. are well dispersed throughout the entire population. We have a uniform culture, although not as uniform as much smaller countries, but uniform nonetheless.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#302

Post by projectileboy »

projectileboy wrote: post #142

Forgive my ignorance, but is it incredibly hard to determine the actual identities of the people behind this? I don’t know why a government wouldn’t simply assassinate culprits who were guilty of crimes at a level that would qualify as an act of war.

I think it’s odd that I’m being downvoted.. I’m not advocating murder, I just wonder if ransomware criminals (assuming they aren’t actually state actors) wouldn’t be at risk.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#303

Post by ocdtrekkie »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #297

"Multiple sources have confirmed that the ransomware attack was caused by a cyber-criminal gang called DarkSide, who infiltrated Colonial's network on Thursday and took almost 100GB of data hostage." re: "infiltrated Colonial's network" I have been reading some of the other reports of this incident from different publications. Many of the stories include a line about attackers downloading "100 GB in only 2 hours" as…

It's a lot easier to pull the plug on on-premise systems.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#304

Post by l33t2328 »

neartheplain wrote: post #75
david-cako wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who was it again that has the most effective intelligence community and military in the world?

I hope you're not talking about the CIA, whose network of agents in China (to pick one example) was rounded up and killed due to either shoddy IT work or a mole in the Agency. Either possiblity reflects poorly on the American intelligence community: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-espionage-idUSK... >Investigators remain divided over whether there was a spy within the Central Intelligence Agency who betr…

Okay, first of all, we have no reason to remotely assume those executed were CIA agents; it’s far(far) more likely they were CIA assets, local people recruited by agents to sell secrets. Assets are captured regularly.

Even still, do you expect any intelligence agency to be perfect? I’m not sure what point you’re trying to prove here.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#305

Post by rurban »

* There exists a decryption tool for DarkSide https://labs.bitdefender.com/2021/01/darkside-ransomware-dec...

* Critical infrastructure should not be allowed to run on Microsoft Windows

* The remote workers, through which the attack was performed, didn't even use a VPN, just TeamViewer and MS Remote Desktop.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#306

Post by wutXthree »

JackFr wrote: post #240
clarkmoody wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make it a crime to possess, consume, or distribute substances that are bad for people. Make it a crime for people to knowingly withhold information about such activities from the authorities. Abuse of substances, trafficking, and associated criminality will go away. But seriously... > Make it a crime to pay the ransom in a ransomware attack. Ok, so ... what should a company do? File a report with some government agen…

I don’t see an analogy to drug laws. Is your point simply that such a law is impractical to enforce? Paying extortionists begets more extortion. The only argument I’m seeing is a bunch of hand waving and people telling me I’m being hopelessly naive. I don’t think I am.

There is already a law. It's called misprison of felony.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#307

Post by TheColorYellow »

vmception wrote: post #19
WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I like how they are charging 10% more if you pay with Bitcoin than with Monero. I smell a business opportunity... Kick off a ransomware attack and accept Bitcoin or a Shitcoin at a 30% discount. Some shitcoins have such little liquidity... a 50k buy would push their price off by hundreds of percentage points. You can even refund their money back after they pay... a modern day pump/dump. The thing about being an eth…

Illiquid asset pumping is the best way to launder the money in the crypto space. AccountA has bought or owns the illiquid asset using clean money, in advance. AccountB has the ransom proceeds in the more liquid digital asset. AccountB eventually buys the illiquid asset and pumps it. All the blockchain detectives are still following AccountB across many more addresses and blockchains, hoping and praying and imagining…

I don't get how Account B gets to the point of extracting value from the illiquid asset after purchasing?

Seems like they either, 1) sell periodically or as the assets value appreciates, but this is generally unreliable and tough or 2) create a liquidity pool or yield farming opportunities

For 1, this isn't necessarily reliable but it seems like the most plausible popular case. For 2, given the previously mentioned challenge of the illiquid asset, how does it work to provide incentive in liquidity pooling and yield farming?

Note, that I'm less well aware of the mechanics of 2 so perhaps its also a fundamental ignorance issue.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#309

Post by cheese_van »

DistressedDrone wrote: post #257
magnusss wrote: post #233

The reason that cyberattacks are proliferating is because it has only recently become easy for the threat actors to receive massive payments quickly and anonymously. Remove that ability and the entire cyberattack ecosystem shuts down instantly. It is only a matter of time before this happens.

I assume you're thinking of blockchain tech? How do you think the genie will be put back in the bottle?

Blockchain has many uses, including as a record of transaction. Crypto currencies are merely a subset of what might be available using blockchain. Legislation can certainly target that subset.

Re: US passes emergency waiver over fuel pipeline cyber-attack

#310

Post by arp242 »

Pfhreak wrote: post #270
okareaman wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solarwinds hack, Mueller report, this... I don't know what the best response is. First we have to wake up that we are under attack.

Take a deep breath, you are jumping at shadows and telling everyone that "they" are out to get us. Thieves are thieves, organized crime is organized crime. You think there aren't major criminal organizations in the US committing ransoms in other countries?

Previous poster isn't wrong that the Russian government turns a blind eye to these kind of things as long as it doesn't target Russian citizens; same with China etc. This isn't especially controversial, and anyone involved with these kind of things will tell you this.

Calling this an "act of war" is of course hysterical.

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