US2Hakrz: 'We're coming for you once we figure out who you are' [Was: Re: Fucking comedy of old white guy parasites [Bruce Schneier's blog]]

[Razer]

Whoever did this, U.S. says of latest hacks, we’re coming after you

With linkage @ Mcclatchy
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article101838132.html

By Tim Johnson
mcclatchydc.com

Top White House and Justice Department officials asked for patience from
the public Wednesday as they refused to say whether Russia or another
nation may be behind a new series of headline-grabbing hacks affecting
the realms of politics and sports.

But they promised that the hacks will not go unpunished – once they are
certain who is responsible for them.

“Whether you are a rogue hacker or a uniformed soldier, the shadowy
corners of the internet will not provide respite for long,” Attorney
General Loretta Lynch said.

A top Lynch deputy, John P. Carlin of the Justice Department’s National
Security Division, said the Obama administration would go after whoever
was responsible, even if they were operating as part of a foreign
government’s institutions.

“The message should be clear: You are not safe because you are operating
under another nation’s flag,” Carlin said. “We can figure out who did
it. It won’t remain anonymous.”

The warnings came as the interim chair of the Democratic National
Committee, Donna Brazile, blamed agents in Russia for the release of new
hacked DNC documents that she said were intended to influence the
outcome of November’s presidential election.

“There’s one person who stands to benefit from these criminal acts, and
that’s Donald Trump,” Brazile said in a statement. “Not only has Trump
embraced (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, he publicly encouraged
further Russian espionage to help his campaign.”

Whoever hacked the DNC, an act first reported in June, provided some
20,000 internal DNC emails to WikiLeaks, which released them a month
later. The hack has fueled concern that foreign cyber-agents might also
meddle directly in the November U.S. election.

Earlier this week, the World Anti-Doping Agency reported that its
database had been penetrated by a Russian espionage group, known as
Fancy Bear, that released information on four U.S. athletes – gymnast
Simone Biles, tennis stars Serena and Venus Williams, and basketball
player Elena Delle Donne. The confidential medical data showed that the
four had used medicines that usually are banned but that may be used
with approval from the International Olympic Committee to treat certain
medical conditions. All four had received permission.

Hundreds of Russian athletes were barred from competing in last month’s
Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro due to suspicions of widespread
doping.

Lisa O. Monaco, President Barack Obama’s top aide on homeland security
and counterterrorism, declined to blame Russia for the latest hacks but
said finger-pointing would come soon enough.

“Folks should stay tuned,” Monaco said at a forum at the Center for
Strategic & International Studies to honor the Justice Department’s
Division of National Security.

“We know Russia is a bad actor in cyberspace, just as China has been,
just as Iran has been,” Monaco said. “Nobody should think that there is
a free pass when you’re conducting malicious cyber-activity.”

“Our reach is long,” added Monaco, a former assistant attorney general.
“Sometimes it takes a long time to build a case but it doesn’t deter us
from pursuing it.”

Lynch noted that U.S. prosecutors in 2014 had charged five members of
China’s People’s Liberation Army with hacking U.S. companies to benefit
Chinese industry. Last year, prosecutors charged seven Iranians,
allegedly linked to the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, with
planning to hack U.S. banks and a New York State dam in an attempt to
disrupt its operation.

Before the indictments of the Chinese army members, Carlin said, few
thought the U.S. government would seriously go after hackers linked to
foreign governments.

“There was a period of time when folks said, ‘Cyber-espionage, Chinese
espionage, there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s too hard. They’re
going to be able to remain anonymous, and this is just the world we have
to accept as the status quo,’ ” Carlin said.

But he said indictments against foreign hackers had proved otherwise.

“For those who think that, be it Russia or any other country, that
there’s going to be a free pass, that we can’t figure out what they are
doing in cyber-enabled espionage, the message should be clear,” he said.

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