Anonymous Hacks NATO, Steals GB Of Data
“Yes, #NATO was breached. And we have lots of restricted material. With some simple injection. In the next days, wait for interesting data :),” Anonymous said via a Twitter post .
Anonymous announced in a tweet that it posessed the NATO data, adding that it would be “irresponsible” to publish much of it.
“We are sitting on about one Gigabyte of data from NATO now, most of which we cannot publish as it would be irresponsible. But Oh NATO....,” the group said.
To prove its claims, the hacker group posted links to two documents on a PDF-sharing site, the first from 2007, titled “NATO Restricted,” outlining communications systems at the Joint Communications Control Centre for ISAF forces in Afghanistan. The second document, also labeled “NATO Restricted” detailed proposals for outsourcing communications systems for NATO forces in Kosovo. A NATO spokesperson confirmed to The Telegraph that the organization had been hacked and was investigating the Anonymous claims.
“NATO is aware that a hackers group has released what it claims to be NATO classified documents on the Internet,” the spokesperson said. “NATO security experts are investigating these claims. We strongly condemn any leak of classified documents, which can potentially endanger the security of NATO Allies, armed forces and citizens.”
In a recent NATO document, titled “Information and National Security,” the organization named Anonymous specifically as a public threat, citing the February attack against security technology company HBGary Federal. During that attack, Anonymous hackers defaced then-CEO Aaron Barr’s social networking profiles and exposed 71,800 e-mails on its own whistleblower site, AnonLeaks.
“Observers note that Anonymous is becoming more and more sophisticated and could potentially hack into sensitive government, military, and corporate files,” the NATO document said. “It remains to be seen how much time Anonymous has for pursuing such paths. The longer these attacks persist the more likely countermeasures will be developed, implemented, the groups will be infiltrated and perpetrators prosecuted."
Anonymous addressed the accusations in a letter to NATO , claiming that the attack was justified in order to expose corruption and ensure that government officials and corporate heads stay within the confines of the law.
“The only threat transparency poses to government is to threaten government’s ability to act in a manner which the people would disagree with, without having to face democratic consequences and accountability for such behaviour," Anonymous wrote. " Your own report cites a perfect example of this, the Anonymous attack on HBGary. Whether HBGary were acting in the cause of security or military gain is irrelevant -- their actions were illegal and morally reprehensible.”
Meanwhile, the recent attack on NATO comes just days after the FBI said it arrested 16 Anonymous hackers for alleged previous attacks against PayPal and other organizations.
Following the arrests, Anonymous and LulzSec posted a joint statement to the FBI Thursday on pastebin.com, challenging a rebuke made by FBI director Steve Chabinsky, who contended that it was “entirely unacceptable to break into websites and commit unlawful acts.” “We are not scared anymore,” LulzSec and Anonymous said in the letter. “Your threats to arrest us are meaningless to us as you cannot arrest an idea. Any attempt to do so will make your citizens more angry until they will roar in one gigantic choir. It is our mission to help these people and there is nothing - absolutely nothing - you can possibly to do make us stop.”