The DarkSide hack on US infrastructure

A soft, cozy place to nap

Last week, Colonial Pipelines was hacked by an organized crime group called DarkSide. The group installed ransomware in CP's computers and the company had to shut down it's entire transmission pipelines from Texas to the East Coast. CP transports 45% of East Coast the oil, diesel and gasoline used in that region of the country, e.g., this hack has a huge impact. The pipelines remain shut down today. The company refuses to say if it paid the ransom or not.

DarkSide is a Russian government-sanctioned criminal organization that can hack and disrupt operations outside of Russia and inside countries Russia deems to be enemies. Quartz writes about the DarkSide crime gang in an article entitled, Hacking collective DarkSide are state-sanctioned pirates:

DarkSide is not a unit of Russia’s intelligence services, and there’s no evidence that it is funded or directed by the Kremlin. Instead, DarkSide is a private, for-profit criminal organization that operates under the benign neglect of Russian authorities. DarkSide reserves its mischief for Russia’s geopolitical rivals—companies based in the US and western Europe—and Russian authorities don’t interfere with its work.

In many ways, DarkSide resembles the privateers that terrorized the seas during the golden age of piracy in the 17th and 18th centuries. In that era, a captain could obtain a letter of marque from a colonial government officially authorizing him to pillage and plunder merchant ships belonging to rival nations—so long as he left his own country’s ships alone. Unlike pirates, who were “enemies of all mankind” and liable to be captured and killed wherever they went, privateers could safely use one of the major powers’ ports as their base of operations.

Hackers get a similar deal. DarkSide is one of the many for-profit ransomware groups that have proliferated and thrived in Russia. These cyber-gangs steal companies’ data and hold it hostage in exchange for ransoms ranging from $200,000 to $20 million. Many of these groups, including DarkSide, slip lines of code into their hacking software that check to see if a victim’s computer uses Russian as its default language; if so, the software automatically stops the attack. Features like this help hackers avoid the ire of their host governments, and ensure that they don’t wear out their welcome in their safe harbor.

“Russian actors tend not to target their own country, mainly because they don’t want law enforcement coming after them,” said Jon Clay, vice president of threat intelligence at cybersecurity firm Trend Micro. “We see that around the world: Depending on which country an actor group is coming from, they tend to stay away from targeting their own.” 

The attack seems to be a serious miscalculation on the part of the cyber criminals. One explanation for the ill-advised attack is that hacking syndicates—much like the privateers of yore—are loose cannons. DarkSide is particularly hard to control because, in addition to carrying out its own attacks, it sells its hacking software as a service to other criminal groups who want to extort companies.

In a May 10 statement, DarkSide seemed to indicate that the Colonial Pipeline attack was the result of an affiliate gone rogue. “Our goal is to make money, and not creating problems for society,” the group wrote. “From today we intoduce [sic] moderation and check each company that our partners want to [attack] to avoid social consequences in the future.”

A few points merit mention. First, Russia remains a deadly enemy that is now engaged in a permanent full-blow war against the US. Russian cyberattacks will not stop. Based on the scope of the Solar Winds hack, Russian cyberattacks can cost the US economy trillions. 

Second, it is not close to credible for any Russian-sanctioned cyberwarfare group to claim their goal is merely to make money, not to cause problems for society. The Russian government will not hesitate to order its criminal minions to launch attacks that could cause trillions in damage and millions of American deaths if it believed that the time and circumstances were right. Knocking out power grids in and infrastructure the US for weeks could cause mass deaths, e.g., by crippling water and sewage treatment plants, food transportation, etc.

Third, US companies continue to be sloppy about computer security. Computer security costs money and that cuts into profits. Due to Republican hate of government as tyranny, companies are not forced to take security seriously. They aren't even required to repost hacks to anyone.[1] Due to mostly Republican-broken American government, the US economy and government is a big, fat juicy target just sitting there for criminals and hostile nations to attack and feed on at their convenience. 

Average Americans pay the price for both the mostly Republican-broken government and unregulated markets with their immoral profit above all mentality. As usual, money talks and everything else walks. No one is looking out for taxpayers or the public interest. In its capitalist greed, America is defenseless and there is no place to look for help. 

Questions: Is it unfair or inaccurate to blame Russia for the CP hack? Solar Winds? Is the seriousness of the threat discussed here as serious as described, or is it at least hyperbole or worse, e.g., flat out lies? Is it fair to mostly blame Republicans for an ineffective government presence in this? Is corporate greed part of the problem, or is that assertion too tenuous to be credible or a major factor?

Footnote: 

1. One source commented in 2018:

Just a friendly reminder that the United States does not, at the time of this writing, have any kind of federal data breach notification laws on the books.

Such a law that would provide specific rules about what a company — let’s say, Equifax, Intel, Uber or Yahoo, just as a couple high-profile examples — has to do after a major hack, like how soon it needs to tell customers the hack occurred and how executives should behave when they find out there’s been a breach.

Truth vs. Indoctrination

Granted, there is a bit of an overlap (since both truth and indoctrination involve the imparting of information), but fundamentally, these are really two different concepts.  The way I see it, the goal of truth is to disseminate facts upon another, while indoctrination’s goal is to disseminate opinions upon another.

Societally speaking, disseminating truth takes on a positive connotation, while disseminating indoctrination takes on a negative one.  Truth can categorically prove its wares, whereas indoctrination cannot.  Indoctrination depends more on receptive, often gullible subjects.

Two great examples of this “truth versus indoctrination” slippery slope can be found in the subjects of religion and politics.  Regarding these subjects, at what point does truth slip (bend) into a form of indoctrination and indoctrination get promoted into a form of truth?  Yes, good question.

Let’s start with religion.  What truths can be proven about religion?  Is it not always a touchy-feely, indoctrination kind of thing, totally dependent on “our feelings?”  Logically speaking, there really is not a lot of logic to it... if any. 

For example, let’s take a major focal point of Christianity: Can it ever be proven, be an objective truth, that Jesus lived, died on a cross, then came back to life three days later?  No, it cannot.  Logically speaking, that’s impossible.  Yet, as children, that’s what we are indoctrinated with. For most of western society, that belief grows with us and psychologically within us, as we grow into adults, and pass it along to our own progeny.  Sure, Jesus might have actually lived.  And sure, he might have been crucified.  So far, so good (or good enough).  But then the story takes a strange turn, heads down the slippery slope, and believing his coming back to life after three days slips us into bizarr-o (indoctrination) territory.  A case where possible truth gets turned into indoctrination.  And it’s not just Christianity; I’m sure all the other orthodox religions do the same thing with their children.  Such are the indoctrination stories with no objective truth, passed on from generation to generation to the especially receptive/gullible.

Let’s take on politics now.  What better example can there be than the current-day “big lie” being perpetuated by the majority of republicans; the big lie being that Donald Trump won the 2020 presidential election?  Votes have been counted and recounted, in some cases even more than twice.  Yet the lie persists, even in the face of contradictory factual evidence.  Like with religions, have Trump’s supporters now slid down that slippery slope, been indoctrinated to believe the big lie?  Personally, I think so.  And it gets worse, more ingrained, the more they hear about it (i.e., the power of suggestion/repetitiveness at work).

___________

Lots of philosophical questions there, along with my “opinions” 😉, and I know things can get really complicated.  Few things are ever cut-and-dried (probably only objective truth ;).  But here are the basic questions I’d like to discuss…

Q1: Whether politics or religion or any other subject matter, is indoctrination just subjective wishful thinking in the face of no facts?  What part of my analysis did I get wrong?

Q2: What do you see as the main difference between truth versus indoctrination?  IOW, at their most fundamental, what are they?  Define them in basic terms.

Q3: Do you think anyone has ever tried to indoctrinate you? If yes, who/when?  Did you ever manage to reject it?  Or do you still embrace it?  Does/Did it give you a sense of identity; like you belonged to a like-thinking collective?  Tell us about any indoctrination experience(s) you’ve had.

Thanks for posting and recommending.

More than fear is driving republicans into fascism

The most common explanation for republican attacks on voting rights and radical authoritarian policies is fear of the ex-president. In an opinion piece for the Washington Post, Greg Sargent makes a compelling case that what the GOP is doing is worse than simple cowering in fear. It is a major, affirmative attack on democracy and elections that nearly the entire GOP leadership openly supports. Sargent writes:

Obviously fear of attacks from Trump — or from right-wing media or primary challengers — is one motivator. But by itself, this simply won’t do: It implies that Republicans would prefer on principle to stand firm in defense of democracy but are not doing so simply out of fear of facing immediate political consequences.

It is impossible to square this reading with the concrete and affirmative steps that many Republicans are taking right now.

Take the shenanigans in Arizona, where GOP state legislators have commissioned a recount of ballots in Maricopa County. It is being conducted by a firm whose chief executive has promoted nonsense about fraud in the 2020 election.

Given all this, it’s impossible to chalk this effort up to “cowardice” or “fear of Trump.” It is a deliberate action plainly undertaken to manufacture fake evidence for the affirmative purpose of further undermining faith in our electoral system going forward.

Stefanik has endorsed this effort. Oozing with phony piety, she claims she merely wants “answers” for Americans concerned about “election security.” Of course, the opposite is true: Stefanik is trying to undermine, not reinforce, voter confidence in our electoral outcomes.

This is not the act of a “coward” who “fears Trump” and would vouch for the integrity of the election if only she could do so without consequences.

Rather, it’s the act of someone who calculates that a willingness to create fake pretexts for treating legitimate election outcomes (ones that Republicans hate) as invalid is a big selling point in today’s GOP. If she does win a leadership role, her calculation will be proven correct.

Underscoring the point, Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), the chair of the Republican Study Committee, made an extraordinarily disingenuous appearance on “Fox News Sunday.” Banks had endorsed the Texas lawsuit, which would have invalidated millions of votes in four states based on fictions, and voted to overturn President Biden’s electors in Congress.

Pressed by Fox’s Chris Wallace to admit Biden won “fair and square,” Banks kinda sorta acknowledged it, but immediately pivoted to claiming those actions were entirely justified, by insisting that his “serious concerns” about the election were still valid.

Time to reckon with GOP radicalization

The lies about 2020 and the increasing dedication to destroying democratic institutions in the quest for power are inextricable from one another. As Jay Rosen says, the press is comfortable calling out the former — it can be packaged as a “fact check." But being forthright about the latter requires depicting one party as far and away the only primary threat to our democratic stability. That’s accurate, but it’s uncomfortably adversarial.  

Relatedly, describing Republicans as “cowards” who “fear Trump” casts their machinations as mere reluctant efforts to cope with externally imposed circumstances they’d prefer not to be dealing with. This lets Republicans off the hook in a very fundamental way. It risks misleading the country about the true depths of GOP radicalization — and the real dangers it poses. (emphasis added)

Some people see the grave danger the Republican party's relentless quest for authoritarian power poses to  democracy, elections, democratic institutions, civil liberties and the rule of law. Few Republican conservatives see this. Some poll data indicates that most independents and Democrats also do not see this danger or its urgency. Conservatives are constantly bathed in comforting dark free speech about the real, immanent danger being Democrats, evil socialism, tyrannical government, threatening immigrants and vicious tyrannical attacks on Christianity, gun ownership and their vision of what America must be. It must be what Republicans want and it will be that way by force if necessary.

Assuming that most Democrats and independents fail to see grave, immediate danger, that is a terrifying blind spot. Republicans can no longer deviate from the path to fascism they are on. Their minds are trapped by their personal and social identities, biases, false beliefs and various circumstances and factors. America is on the verge of falling to an American radical right fascism.

Public relations for powerful dictators

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman:

I'm a good person, honest! My PR firm says so!

An interesting Washington Post opinion piece focuses on American public relations firms that work to clean up the images of powerful thugs and dictators throughout the world. These fine American companies prepare dark free speech, propaganda and lies for bad people who have done bad things. These fake bad people reputations make them look like good people who do good things. The propaganda is intended to deny or at least deflect public attention from the bad things the bad people did and usually still do. These services are popular with brutal dictators.

The WaPo writes:

Saudi Arabia: The oil-rich kingdom deserves top rank here for the enormity of both the fees and the crime involved. .... Since Khashoggi’s death, some two dozen U.S. firms have picked up more than $73 million in fees for representing Saudi interests, according to reports they have filed with the Justice Department. Chief among them was the kingdom’s longtime main lobbying firm, Qorvis, which said in a statement at the time of Khashoggi’s disappearance that “we take the situation seriously” and would “wait for all the facts to become known.”

Meanwhile, the crown prince continues to have his reputation as a visionary world leader burnished with news releases like the one prepared in January by Edelman hailing Neom, the futuristic city the prince has ordered up on the Red Sea. (Edelman took in $6.7 million from the Saudis since Khashoggi’s murder before completing its latest contracts in January, according to Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA, filings.) Or in a Hogan Lovells-produced release crediting the crown prince for “new efforts to combat extremist ideology and shut down hate speech.” This about a country that routinely makes female journalists the targets of misogynistic trolling campaigns.

The Philippines: Over the past few years, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has been busy shuttering his nation’s largest broadcaster and conducting an infamous campaign of online and legal harassment against much-lauded journalist and entrepreneur Maria Ressa (who just added the UNESCO press freedom prize to honors from the Committee to Protect Journalists, the National Press Club and many more).

China: Global rainmakers Squire Patton Boggs continue to represent Beijing’s interests in Washington for a retainer of $55,000 a month, according to the firm’s most recent contract, dated last July. The firm’s January filing with the Justice Department reported payments of $330,000 from the Chinese Embassy for the previous six months of work, which included advice on “U.S. policy concerning Hong Kong, Taiwan, Xinjiang and Tibet,” among other places where Beijing has been trying to muzzle dissidents, and “matters pertaining to human rights,” according to the firm’s latest filing with the Justice Department’s foreign-agent registration database.

The fine firm, Qorvis, said that “we take the situation seriously” and would “wait for all the facts to become known.” That is liar speak for “we could not care less who our client murdered or what the facts are because money talks and everything else walks, including truth and democracy. So buzz off, you busybodies. We have our free speech rights and we are going to use them any way we want.” 

Good ole' public relations companies. What would we do without these fine patriots? Would God approve of these fine people and their hard work?

Innocent and good?