The National Security Agency is a little less secure these days – it was recently announced that they were victim to a significant hack attack from “Shadow Brokers”. However, they themselves are also connected to one of the most extensive hacks in recent history according to Kaspersky Lab. In a world where cyber attacks are far-reaching and constantly evolving, will our national security be able to stay one step ahead of these innovative government hackers?
When it was announced that the National Security Agency had experienced a significant hack and top-secret information was stolen, fingers started pointing at parties related to the Russian government. Eventually the group “Shadow Brokers” came out from the woodwork and began to boast of its treasure trove; specifically they mentioned what are known as cyberweapons used by the NSA to attack perceived enemies of the US government. This is where we have to go back a few years, because while the NSA is the overall body with the cyberweapons in its possession, it was a particular group that worked with them. Known as the “Equation Group”, they were the ones taking action by creating hundreds of backdoors to government networks in Russia, China, India, Britain, the list goes on.
Currently, the grandstanding continues online. The Shadow Brokers are taunting users online, saying that for one million bitcoins ($576 Million) they will release the rest of the information they have from the hack. Though they aren’t anywhere near reaching their goal it brings up a lot of questions that many of us have yet to even realize need answers. One would probably be, it’s the National Security Agency – how were they hacked to begin with? Unfortunately we probably won’t ever know, but most of the time these super sensitive data troves are stored within air-gapped systems and not connected to the Internet. So, with that, could it have been a disgruntled employee with a flash drive? Potentially, but again it’s all speculation.
As a whole, these findings speak to the uncomfortable truth of cyber espionage becoming a bigger part of the national and international narrative. A small silver lining is that cyber security is easily kept in our own smaller narratives. Whether your business has one location or ten, guaranteeing the continued protection of your network so that both you, your employees, and your clients are safe and secure is the top priority at Neovera, a managed and monitored security services provider. With 24x7x365 protection, detection, and remediation, Neovera can take cyber security worries off your hands and protect your sensitive network information.