The Equation Group-NSA

[brick4956]

The Equation Group which consists of over 60 threat actors had a server of there's recently hacked and has cyberweapons/tools stolen from said server. The equation group ran probably the most sophisticated hacking operations in history for over 15 years the operated without anyone knowing of the groups existence they have a lot of ties to the nsa and some say the nsa is directly behind this hacking get group as with the Snowden leaks filenames tie back directly to some of the things mentioned in his leak. The equation group also has ties to Struxnet the hacking program that took out Iran's nuclear program years ago. If this leak is confirmed to be true then that would implicate the NSA in a massive spying operation against its citizens and own allies. Kapesky Labs uncovered the nsa tied equation group.

https://www.google.com/search?q=kas...AUICCgC&biw=360&bih=560#imgrc=r_ky6IJ2QBZecM:

 

[brick4956]

This could make the United States look really bad. This hacking group started up in 2001 after 9/11 could have been a response to that terror attack to start spying on other nations

 

[brick4956]

Confirmed: hacking tool leak came from “omnipotent” NSA-tied group | Ars Technica

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/08/major_nsaequati.html

 

[brick4956]

Cisco confirms NSA-linked zeroday targeted its firewalls for years | Ars Technica

 

[Irish#1]

This doesn't surprise me at all. The US has been spying on everyone for ages, including its allies. If you dig deep enough, you'll find this is true for most other countries as well. The server and hacking program are simply different tools being used then what was used years ago.

 

[dublinirish]

'Zero Days' film tells the true story of the Stuxnet cyber weapon - Tech Insider

worth a watch

 

[Veritate Duce Progredi]

If anyone is interested in reading about how sophisticated this group is, read this article by ArsTechnica last year:

how-omnipotent-hackers-tied-to-the-nsa-hid-for-14-years-and-were-found-at-last/

Their exploits went deeper than anyone had previously seen. Usually this type of software goes as deep as the OS, masking itself as 'part of the system' or hiding altogether. Incredible stuff and one of my favorite reads from last year.

One of the things that stuck with me:

Beyond the technical similarities to the Stuxnet and Flame developers, Equation Group boasted the type of extraordinary engineering skill people have come to expect from a spy organization sponsored by the world's wealthiest nation. One of the Equation Group's malware platforms, for instance, rewrote the hard-drive firmware of infected computers—a never-before-seen engineering marvel that worked on 12 drive categories from manufacturers including Western Digital, Maxtor, Samsung, IBM, Micron, Toshiba, and Seagate.

The malicious firmware created a secret storage vault that survived military-grade disk wiping and reformatting, making sensitive data stolen from victims available even after reformatting the drive and reinstalling the operating system. The firmware also provided programming interfaces that other code in Equation Group's sprawling malware library could access. Once a hard drive was compromised, the infection was impossible to detect or remove.

 

[Fbolt]

awesome

 

[brick4956]

May have been an inside job former nsa employee confirmed that the data that was stolen could only be viewed or accessed internally as they have an air gap based system meaning no connections to the Internet

 

[brick4956]

May have another Snowden except this dude covered his/her tracks if it is an inside job