Experts see nation-state behind sophisticated computer virus attack

September 29, 2010 by 2 Comments

Ahmadinejad

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Computer forensics specialists are split as to the purpose and initial target of a sophisticated computer virus that infected computers used in the Iranian government’s nuclear energy program. The virus, named Stuxnet, was discovered in Iran in June by a Belarusian computer security firm doing business in the Islamic Republic. It has since infected at least 100,000 computer systems in countries such as Brazil, India, Russia and the United States. But the primary target of the virus appears to have been the Iranian nuclear energy program, specifically computers located at the Islamic Republic’s nuclear reactor facility in Bushehr and the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz. Several commentators, including Wired magazine, dispute the existence of any evidence pointing to a clear target inside Iran.  But Israeli media maintain that computers at Natanz were the primary target of Stuxnet, and that subsequent infections at computer labs at Bushehr were in fact an unintended side effect. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #435 (cyberwarfare edition)

September 28, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • Analysis: Cyber attacks test US Pentagon. US military and civilian networks are probed thousands of times a day, and the systems of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization headquarters are attacked at least 100 times a day. Meanwhile, more than 100 countries are currently trying to break into US defense networks.
  • US should be able to shut Internet, ex-CIA chief says. Cyberterrorism is such a threat that the US President should have the authority to shut down the Internet in the event of an attack, Former CIA Director Michael Hayden has said.
  • Iran battling alleged ‘spy virus’. Iranian officials have confirmed reports that a malicious computer code, called Stuxnet, was spreading throughout the nation’s nuclear infrastructure. But they have given differing accounts of the damage, said to be capable of taking over computers that operate huge facilities, including nuclear energy reactors. Did someone say ‘Israel‘?

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Lawsuit claims CIA uses pirate software in drone assassinations

September 28, 2010 by 1 Comment

Predator drone

Predator drone

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
The Central Intelligence Agency is using stolen software code in its covert Predator drone assassination program in Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to a lawsuit filed by a software company in the US state of Massachusetts. The software company, Intelligent Integration Systems, Inc. (IISi), which is based in Boston, accuses the CIA of unlawfully using proprietary coding, purchased through Netezza Corporation, a former partner of IISi. The latter claims Netezza sold the CIA a software application called Spatial, which the CIA uses to perform targeted killings through its unmanned drone program. But IISi alleges that Spatial contains stolen coding initially developed by its programmers. What is more, the company claims that the pirated coding is in fact defective, and that the CIA runs the risk of its unmanned Predator drone strikes “being off by about 40 feet”. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #434 (book news edition)

September 27, 2010 by Leave a comment

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Lebanon charges PKK Kurds with spying for Israel

September 27, 2010 by 5 Comments

PKK banner

PKK banner

By IAN ALLEN| intelNews.org |
Lebanese authorities have detained three alleged members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) on charges of spying for Israel. The three arrestees, whose names have not been released to the media, were reportedly arrested last week by Lebanese military intelligence forces in Jounieh, a town located on the Mediterranean coast, about 15 kilometers north of Beirut. The arrests form part of a wider Lebanese counterintelligence offensive that has netted over 100 alleged Israeli agents in Lebanon since April of 2009. But news of the detentions have inflamed an ongoing discussion in Turkey about alleged covert links between Israeli intelligence agencies and Kurdish separatists operating in Turkey, Iraq and Syria. Read more of this post

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Analysis: Deadly conflict inside Iraqi spy service goes unmentioned

September 23, 2010 by Leave a comment

Iraq

Iraq

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Amidst the chaos of post-Ba’athist Iraqi politics, a deadly sectarian conflict is raging within Iraq’s powerful spy agency. Employees inside Iraq’s National Intelligence Service (INIS) are split along religious sectarian lines, with Sunni and Shiite officers battling for control of the organization. The warring factions are directly affiliated with opposing political parties, and represent various political interests. Shiite officers are seen as aligned with Tehran, whereas Sunnis are close to Washington and –ironically– to the remnants of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party. The conflict has resulted in the assassination of several INIS officers, mostly by their colleagues in the Service, according to two anonymous Iraqi security officials, who spoke to The National, an English-language newspaper published in the United Arab Emirates. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #433

September 22, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • White House quiet on Pollard release speculation. The Barack Obama administration is staying silent on a reported offer from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to extend a settlements freeze in the occupied areas, in exchange for the release of Jonathan Pollard, currently held in a US prison for spying on America for Israel.
  • ‘The Secret History of MI6’ published. An authorized history of the first forty years of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, has been published by Bloomsbury. The book is written by Professor Keith Jeffery, of Queen’s University, Belfast, based on his unrestricted access to SIS archives of the period.
  • Pakistan accuses Briton of spying. Authorities in Pakistan are holding a 70-year-old Briton on suspicion of spying for almost a month in the country’s lawless tribal areas. Nicholas Bain, who claims he is an author researching a book, is suspected of “working for a British intelligence agency”, according to a Pakistani official.

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Israel offers settlement freeze in exchange for US spy’s release

September 21, 2010 by 5 Comments

Jonathan Pollard

Jonathan Pollard

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Israeli government officials are considering extending a settlement freeze in Israeli-occupied territories in exchange for the release of an American citizen serving a life sentence for spying on the US for Israel. Laura Rozen over at Politico reports that a representative of the embassy of Israel in Washington DC has denied knowledge of the rumored deal. But according to Israel Army Radio, an envoy of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has already “unofficially” passed the proposal along to US government officials. If accepted by the White House, the deal would involve the freezing of all new construction of illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, in exchange for the release of Jonathan Jay Pollard, a US Navy intelligence analyst who in 1987 was sentenced to life imprisonment for spying on the US on behalf of Israel. Pollard, who has since been awarded honorary Israeli citizenship, and is considered a hero in Israel, has so far served 25 years in prison. Read more of this post

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Swiss army planned covert operations in Libya

September 20, 2010 by 2 Comments

Hannibal Gaddafi

Hannibal Gaddafi

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Swiss intelligence planned three separate covert missions to Libya in 2008 and 2009 in order to free two Swiss businessmen held by Libyan authorities, according to a Swiss newspaper. Citing a confidential document drafted by Switzerland’s ministry of foreign affairs, the Sunday edition of Neue Zürcher Zeitung revealed that one of the three planned missions involved an exploratory visit to Libya by an unnamed Swiss undercover officer. The operative, reportedly an employee of AAD-10, an elite intelligence unit in the Swiss Land Forces, visited Libya in civilian disguise, after legally receiving a visa permit from the government of Libya. According to Neue Zürcher Zeitung, his mission was to prepare an operation to abduct from the hands of Libyan authorities two Swiss citizens, Max Goeldi and Rachid Hamdani. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #432

September 17, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • French spy agency chief warns of high terror risk. Bernard Squarcini, director of France’s Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST) counterintelligence agency, has warned that the country’s military presence in Afghanistan is among the reasons that have made France a prime target for radical Islamist groups.
  • Iran frees one of three Americans held on spy charges. American Sarah Shourd, who has been held in Iran for more than a year on suspicion of spying, has been released by authorities in the Islamic Republic.
  • American civil rights photographer was FBI informant. New information shows that celebrated civil rights-era photographer Ernest Withers had been a paid informant for the FBI, reporting on the whereabouts and activities of the movement’s leaders, many of whom considered him a personal friend.

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British informant sues MI5 for breach of contract

September 16, 2010 by 1 Comment

RIRA gunmen

RIRA gunmen

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
An informant, who was used by British intelligence to infiltrate an Irish Republican dissident group, is suing the British government claiming he was forced to give evidence in court despite his will. The case, which is believed to be the first of its kind in British legal history, has been brought before the court by a man identified only as “Amir”. Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, MI5, has admitted recruiting Amir in 2004, and using him to infiltrate the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA), a Provisional IRA splinter group that continues its armed campaign against British presence in Northern Ireland. But the informant claims that he accepted payment from MI5 on condition that he would never be expected to testify as a witness in court. Read more of this post

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CIA knew of Colombian infiltration of Bogota embassies

September 15, 2010 by Leave a comment

DAS seal

DAS seal

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
A Colombian former intelligence official has testified in court that the CIA was aware of an aggressive intelligence collection program by Colombian spies, involving the infiltration of several foreign embassies in Colombian capital Bogota. German Albeiro Ospina, who until recently worked as an investigator for Colombia’s Administrative Department of Security (DAS), said the program was conceived and ordered by the agency’s former Director, Maria del Pilar Hurtado, and implemented by Jorge Alberto Lagos, former DAS Director of counterintelligence. The infiltration program was directed against “countries and persons that were of national interest” to Colombia, and involved techniques such as “surveillance, shadowing, infiltration and penetration of the embassies of [targeted] governments”. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #431

September 14, 2010 by Leave a comment

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US Pentagon to ban book by DIA intelligence officer

September 14, 2010 by 1 Comment

Operation Dark Heart

Op. Dark Heart

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
American military officials are in negotiations with a major publishing firm to prevent the distribution of a new book on the Afghanistan War by a US intelligence officer, even though thousands of copies of the book have already been printed. Written by US Army Reserve Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, the book, Operation Dark Heart, is a personal memoir of the author’s five-month tour in Afghanistan in 2003, as an officer with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). The Pentagon has admitted that its censors did send Shaffer an official clearance letter, authorizing him to forward the manuscript to a publisher –which he did. But it was only after the book had gone into print, that the Defense Department realized that it had neglected to forward a copy of the manuscript to the DIA, as required by regulations, which stipulate that all US government agencies mentioned in the manuscript must approve it prior to publication. Read more of this post

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