Cyber Week in Review: August 15, 2024

Trump campaign hacked, FBI announces probe

The FBI announced it’s probing the hack and leak of Trump campaign documents, which  Microsoft attributed broadly to the Iranian threat actor Mint Sandstorm. Hackers were allegedly able to compromise the personal email account of Roger Stone, a long-time Trump campaign staffer, and may have used this access to gain a foothold on the campaign’s network. Several news outlets, including Politico and the Washington Post, said they had received leaked documents from the Trump campaign earlier this week, a few days before the campaign announced it had been hacked. Several of the outlets said they would not publish the documents, citing a policy to not report on materials leaked by foreign governments. The documents included research on potential vice presidential nominees for the campaign, along with internal communications between staffers. In response to the leaks, a Trump campaign spokesman declared that “any media or news outlet reprinting documents or internal communications are doing the bidding of America’s enemies.” This marks a decided shift from the Trump campaign’s stance during the 2016 presidential election, in which Trump campaigned extensively on a Wikileaks dump of emails associated with Hillary Clinton, and his campaign staff—according to the Mueller report—coordinated closely with Wikileaks regarding their release. Those emails were the result of a coordinated campaign by Russian hackers, who compromised the email account of John Podesta, then chairman of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

Huawei prepares to introduce new microchip

Huawei is close to launching a new AI chip, the Ascend 910C, designed to compete with top offerings from American, Taiwanese, and European microchip makers operating in the Chinese market. Huawei has begun rolling out the chip to some of its largest companies, and it has told these customers that 910C is comparable to Nvidia’s line of H100 chips. The H100 is one of Nvidia’s most advanced designs and is currently the subject of U.S. sanctions which restrict Chinese access, although a thriving black market for the H100 still exists in China. The Chinese government has steadily pushed to reduce its technological dependence on the United States; internal CCP documents describe a push to “delete America” and shore up Chinese manufacturing of advance components, including semiconductors. While the production of the 910C appears to reflect those priorities, Huawei’s launch has been plagued by production delays and supply chain challenges.

FBI and DOJ announce takedown of ransomware network

A multi-national operation led by U.S. law enforcement has seized websites linked to the Dispossessor ransomware gang, an offshoot of the earlier LockBit ransomware gang. U.S. agencies, including the FBI, collaborated with European agencies to take down Dispossessor’s leak site and internal infrastructure. Dispossessor had begun operating earlier this year as an offshoot of the now-defunct ransomware gang LockBit, which was itself the target of an international takedown operation earlier this year. Dispossessor was created by two former LockBit affiliates who made use of LockBit’s source code to launch their own ransomware-as-a-service offering. This choice to use LockBit as a template may have enabled the quick takedown of Dispossessor, given LockBit’s previous dismantling by government agencies. Over the past two years, governments in the United States and Europe have collaborated on broad efforts to combat ransomware by dismantling key networks and seizing domains used by cybercriminals, with several notable takedowns occurring.

UN committee passes cybercrime treaty

The UN Ad Hoc Committee on Cybercrime unanimously approved a new global cybercrime treaty late last week, capping off a two-week negotiating session that sought to finalize the treaty and the nearly three-year process which led up to its release. The treaty will be voted on at the UN General Assembly meeting in September and, if passed, will be finalized. The treaty establishes legal frameworks for member states to cooperate more effectively in investigating and prosecuting cybercrimes; and outlines provisions for mutual assistance between signatories, extradition of cybercriminals, and information-sharing across borders. The treaty has drawn severe criticism from former U.S. officials and human rights organizations, however, who have argued that the treaty would enable authoritarian regimes to more easily surveil dissidents, request their extradition, and curtail speech and other civil and political rights across borders. Many of the treaty’s provisions are broad and vague and could increase pressure on democratic governments to share information on sensitive investigations.

Indian government withdraws controversial broadcast bill

The Indian government has withdrawn a draft broadcasting services bill following backlash from online content creators and civil liberties groups. The bill, initially circulated by India’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in July, would have regulated large online content creators if they produced content related to news or current events. Influencers played a major role in India’s elections earlier this year, motivating younger, previously disinterested voters to turn out in surprising numbers. India’s ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party and its leader, Narendra Modi, saw its hold on electoral power significantly diminished in India’s parliamentary elections earlier this year, and spearheaded the bill in its original form. Critics of the bill, including several content creators, raised concerns over its potential to stifle free speech and impose heavy compliance burdens on small businesses. In response to these concerns, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting extended the consultation period until October 15.