Surveillance firm Hacking Team hacked [Updated]

Pierluigi Paganini July 06, 2015

Hacking Team, the Italian surveillance firm that develops spyware and hacking software has been hacked by attackers that exfiltrated some 400Gbs of data.

The Italian security firm Hacking Team has allegedly been hacked, unknown attackers have exfiltrated some 400Gbs of data. The company has often been at the center of heated debate because of surveillance solutions that it develops, many experts and privacy advocated arguing that the company sells its products to oppressive and dictatorial regimes.

At the timeI’m writing there is no information on how the attack was carried out or even when it occurred.

hacking team hacked 2

The Hacking Team alleged sold its solutions to customers in Lebanon, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan, for this reason, hacktivist at Reporters Without Borders marked the company as an Enemy of the Internet.

On Sunday Eva Galperin, global policy analyst at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, shared the list of countries said to be customers of the Italian Hacking Team.

According to exploit activist Christopher Soghoian (@csoghoian) Chile allegedly bought the surveillance software last year for $US2.85 million.

The stolen data has been uploaded to BitTorrent, it includes a huge number of directories containing source code, emails, and also audio recordings.

Among the software solutions sold by the Hacking Team, there is the Da Vinci surveillance platform, a software used by law enforcement agencies to spy on suspects.

The hackers also hijacked the Hacking Team ‘s Twitter account to share screenshots of the stolen data as proof of the attack.

hacking team hacked 4

 

hacking team hacked 5

It’s curious that in the following image, the CEO of hacking team David Vincenzetti share the news related the hacking of their competitor FinFisher, another powerful surveillance software developed by Gamma Group.

hacking team hacked
hacking team hacked 3

The Hackers are tweeting the alleged contents of other emails from Hacking Team CEO David Vincenzetti which demonstrates that the company is doing business with oppressive governments. The torrent listings also include login credentials for the company’s support sites in Egypt, Mexico, and Turkey.

Experts that are analyzing the stolen data are starting to share news regarding the documents it includes such as:
  • The invoice for 58,000 Euro to Egypt for Hacking Team’s RCS Exploit Portal. (source Csoonline)
  • An email from a person linked to several domains allegedly tied to the Meles Zenawi Foundation (MZF), Ethiopia’s Prime Minister. In the email Biniam Tewolde thanks to Hacking Team for its services. It seems Ethiopia paid $1,000,000 Birr (ETB) for Hacking Team’s Remote Control System, professional services, and communications equipment.
  • An invoice of 480,000 Euro demonstrates that the Hacking Team have done business with Sudan with used also surveillance software to track and suppress dissidents.
  • Documents, shared by SynAckPwn with Salted Hash, related the maintenance agreement status of a number of customers includes Russia and Sudan as clients of the Hacking Team. They are flagged as “Not officially supported”.hacking team hacked 7
  • Hacking Team currently has, based on internal documents leaked by the attackers on Sunday evening, customers in the following locations (source Csoonline):
    Egypt, Ethiopia, Morocco, Nigeria, Sudan, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, United States ,Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mongolia, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Australia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Luxemburg, Poland, Russia, Spain, Switzerland, Bahrain, Oman Saudi Arabia, UAE. 
  • The Twitter account of Christian Pozzi (@christian_pozzi), a representative of the company was also hacked.hacking team hacked 8

Hacking Team is verifying the material, let’s wait for official information on its authenticity

Stay Tuned …

 

[adrotate banner=”9″] [adrotate banner=”12″]

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs – Hacking Team, RCS)

[adrotate banner=”5″]

[adrotate banner=”13″]



you might also like

leave a comment