Attention

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not represent our advertisers

Friday, August 19, 2016

Julian Assange Is Making Good On His Promise To Snitch On US Spooks

The breach of an elite NSA-linked hacking unit dubbed the Equation Group, which exposed a number of cyber weapons used by US spooks, Julian Assange’s WikiLeaks who has come to terms with the fact that his idea of extortion for $550m has miserably failed and gone down the toilet, is now claiming he will publish a ‘pristine’ version of the hacked data online for the world to see.

The cyber-espionage toolset, which was first teased online by a mysterious group calling itself The Shadow Brokers, contains what purports to be NSA exploits previously used by the agency to target computers, firewalls and routers. After releasing one file as proof of legitimacy, the hackers opened an auction and demanded one million bitcoin — the equivalent of at least $550m – to hand over the rest.

Yet now, WikiLeaks, the infamous leaking website founded by Julian Assange, has waded into the story and indicated it now plans to release the alleged NSA data in full. However, it remains unknown how or when the group got hold of such sensitive information.

“We had already obtained the archive of NSA cyber weapons released earlier today and will release our own pristine copy in due course,” the WikiLeaks Twitter account published on 16 August. The organization did not respond to a request for comment regarding when the data would be made public.

More

No comments: