News you may have missed #617
October 28, 2011 Leave a comment
Ilan Grapel
►►Analysis: Is the CIA Still an Intelligence Agency? Early September 2011, a former intelligence official commented to The Washington Post that, “The CIA has become one hell of a killing machine”. He then attempted to retract, but his words were on record. But is that really what it should be: a hell of a killing machine?
►►US National Security Agency helps Wall Street battle hackers. The National Security Agency, a secretive arm of the US military, has begun providing Wall Street banks with intelligence on foreign hackers, a sign of growing US fears of financial sabotage. While government and private sector security sources are reluctant to discuss specific lines of investigations, they paint worst-case scenarios of hackers ensconcing themselves inside a bank’s network to disable trading systems for stocks, bonds and currencies, trigger flash crashes, initiate large transfers of funds or turn off all ATM machines.
►►Israel okays deal with Egypt to free alleged spy. Israel’s security cabinet unanimously approved an agreement Tuesday for the release of Israeli-American law student Ilan Grapel (pictured), who has been in jail in Egypt since June 12 on spying allegations that were later reduced to incitement. In exchange, Israel will release 22 Egyptian prisoners, most of them Bedouin from the Sinai jailed for smuggling drugs or weapons.
intelNews.org 
News you may have missed #620 (cyberespionage edition)
November 1, 2011 by Ian Allen Leave a comment
GCHQ
►►Canada government ‘warned prior to cyberattack’. Canada’s spy agency, CSIS, warned the government that federal departments were under assault from rogue hackers just weeks before an attack crippled key computers. A newly released intelligence assessment, prepared last November, sounded a security alarm about malicious, targeted emails disguised as legitimate messages —the very kind that shut down networks two months later.
►►GCHQ warns cyber crime reaches ‘disturbing’ levels. Cyber attacks on the British government, the public and industry have reached “disturbing” levels, according to the director of Britain’s biggest intelligence agency. Iain Lobban, who runs the British government’s listening centre, GCHQ, has warned that the “UK’s continued economic wellbeing” is under threat.
►►Japanese parliament hit by cyber-attack. Alleged Chinese hackers were able to snoop upon emails and steal passwords from computers belonging to lawmakers at the Japanese parliament for over a month, according to Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun. The paper claims that computers and servers were infected after a Trojan virus was emailed to a Lower House member in July. The Trojan then allegedly downloaded malware from a server allegedly based in China —allowing remote hackers to secretly spy on email communications and steal usernames and passwords from Japanese lawmakers.
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