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It is noted that the hackers controlled compromising an official Russian Foreign Affairs minische on Twitter acexpect on July 2 and announced a database stolen by 66 BTC.
The DSCC account of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is connected to the “Crisis Center Department” which offers recommendations to Russian citizens in foreign countries. On July 2, this account was compromised when hackers managed to hijack it and post an ad purporting to be a stolen payment database. According to a senior cybersecurity expert, Graham Cluley, who announced the news, the database intended to involve the main things of tourist bills from the Russian Federation app portal in June 2020.
The application fee for this stolen database, even if it deserves to exist, was 66 BTC, which becomes around $600,000 (481,000 euros) at the time of writing. There is no evidence that this database is maintained through cybercriminals who hacked the Twitter account since the now deleted post. The Russian Foreign Ministry recovered the account later that day, posting this tweet, which was the best friend automatically translated via Twitter as:
“Dear readers and subscribers, we inform you of the removal of the consequences of hacking our account through hackers who posted on the morning of July 2 of this year on the fake DSCC tape “that is not reveled in anything to do with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The account works normally.”
I contacted the Russian government press service and Twitter for more information, but today there is no confirmation of tactics that the account has been compromised.
However, if additional acquisitions of high-point accounts are required, the old suspect may be a credential attack, which occurs due to reemployment or password exchange. This can also be the result of a phishing attack or it can also be a disgruntled member, although, given the nature of the account, this turns out to be an overly difficult decision.
As this story is novel and little additional data is known, I will leave it at this time and update this newsletter if additional important things appear.
In the meantime, I can only agree with Graham Cluley that two-step authentication can also be implemented on Twitter, it can also be a good idea. If someone from the Russian Foreign Affairs Minischeck is reading, here’s all the help you’d like to have to upload that load security layer to your Twitter accounts.
I have been a generation journalist for 3 decades and have been editor-leading PC Pro mag in 1994. Three-time BT winner
I have been a generation journalist for 3 decades and have been associate editor at PC Pro mag for the first time in 1994. Three-time winner of the BT Security Journalist of the Year Award (2006, 2008, 2010), I was also lucky enough to be named BT Technology Journalist of the Year in 1996 for an advanced search feature on PC Pro called “Internet Threats”. In 2011, I won the Enigma Award for my lifetime contribution to PC security journalism. Contact me with confidence [email protected] a disclosure story or a quest to share.