Hackers Breached White House Network... And Some Other Country Told The US About It

from the best-cybersecurity-folks? dept

Wed, Oct 29th 2014 12:40pm — Mike Masnick

So, there's a story in the Washington Post that's getting a bit of attention about how Russian hackers apparently breached a White House computer network (an unclassified network, so not as troubling as it could have been). And that story is kind of interesting, but it seems like the bigger deal is this:

U.S. officials were alerted to the breach by an ally, sources said.

Wait a second. After all we've been told about the brilliant minds at the NSA/US Cyber Command and their "cybersecurity" skills -- it seems immensely troubling that (1) the US didn't catch this themselves and (2) that some other country did catch it. So, uh, just why is some "ally" monitoring the White House's network?

As for the rest of the report, as the Washington Post notes, this isn't even that big of a deal. Foreign state hackers are always going to try to breach US government computers, and sometimes they're going to succeed. That's the nature of the beast. But, it does seem profoundly odd that it was discovered by some other country.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: cybersecurity, hacking, network, nsa, russians, security, us cyber command, white house

37 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 12:51pm

Ally telling US is not an indication that NSA did not know
The NSA is infamous for giving up information only under very direct questioning from very powerful people. The administration has repeatedly claimed that it learns of various scandals from news reports, so it likely is not exercising whatever supervisory power it has over the NSA. From this, it follows that just because the White House had to learn about the breach from an ally does not mean that the NSA did not know about it. It only follows that the NSA did not tell the White House, maybe because it did not know or maybe because volunteering information is just such an alien concept to NSA employees.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Pegr, 29 Oct 2014 @ 5:36pm
  
  Re: Ally telling US is not an indication that NSA did not know
  So then they told the Brits to make a call. Hilarious!
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- jim, 30 Oct 2014 @ 5:14am
  
  Re: Ally telling US is not an indication that NSA did not know
  You forgot the rest of the sentence, about the powerful person, and even then they will lie.
  With the NSA watching, probably, what was caught, was the NSAWatcher. Oops, shouldn't have said that. And their backdoor.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Reality bites, 1 Nov 2014 @ 8:37am
    
    NSA.. are a collection of cretins, deviants, voyeurs and traitors
    you over estimate their to find their own butt with written directions.
    
    The NSA collects everything but like the bully child stealing all the toys... isn't capable use any of it.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 12:51pm

So much for "Trust us, we know what we're doing"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Reality bites, 1 Nov 2014 @ 8:39am
  
  Trust is for silly children and the religious
  Anyone trusting a feral gov animal deserves exactly what they get. A damn good mauling.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 29 Oct 2014 @ 12:51pm

Makes sense
There does seem to be a "You watch my house, I'll watch yours" quid pro quo going on.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 12:53pm

Not questioning the validity of the reported claims, but this story seems like a convenient way to stir up anti-Russian sentiment.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Blaine (profile), 29 Oct 2014 @ 12:57pm

Outsourceing
Maybe the White House should hire an outside expert?

I hear there's some Keith Alexander guy that's has some new magic security technology that he came up with all on his own.... but he doesn't come cheap.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 1:01pm

Glancing back at the previous stories of today, I'd guess that something along the lines of the "UK's GCHQ Can Get Warrantless Access To Bulk NSA Data" happened. The other guys noticed something in the data they searched and tipped off the NSA/White House/whatever. Assuming that the NSA/equivalent believes in their own good faith and doesn't search their own data as wantonly as they'd search data gathered from a foreign source.

Or it might just be that the ally noticed the tracks others left as they themselves sneaked in. Whichever.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:42pm
  
  Re:
  Even more likely: GCHQ was tracking the foreign attackers already and flagged up the intrusion after they wandered in to US Gov't property.
  
  There's more than one way to notice an intrusion, after all. Since it was an ally that noticed, it would make sense for them to be monitoring the other end of the connection.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 1:04pm

All good points.

"maybe because it did not know or maybe because volunteering information is just such an alien concept to NSA employees"

Or maybe because they needed time to remove their own trail,

or maybe because they wanted to see how good the team monitoring the WH were,

or maybe they wanted to see which ally would tell the WH and which wouldn't even though all of them knew (who's a tittle-tattle?)

or maybe because the culprits weren't actually Russians,

or maybe because they felt the WH didn't need to know,

or maybe because the brilliant cyberwarriors are too busy monitoring the real traitors (that would be us)

and so on ad infinitum. Spying is such a fun, endless game. Guaranteed career for life, good pension, easier flying a keyboard than risking life and limb.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:55pm
  
  Re:
  Spying is such a fun, endless game. Guaranteed career for life...
  
  The career may be guaranteed, but the life is not.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 3:46pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Guaranteed for Life does not imply the Life is long.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:19pm

Playing devil's advocate
So, uh, just why is some "ally" monitoring the White House's network?

The monitoring might have been at the other end. For instance, the "ally" might have been after a hotdog smuggling ring, and found in their seized servers evidence of data obtained from the White House network, given to them by the real hacker in exchange for a box of really good hotdogs.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:52pm
  
  Re: Playing devil's advocate
  Yeah I would tend to think this is what happened. However most people monitor their incoming a lot closer than their outgoing traffic.
  
  Looks like the WH needs to hire that Keith Alexander guy, he has to be the best since he is the most expensive.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 30 Oct 2014 @ 8:18am
  
  Re: Playing devil's advocate
  even if it's not at the other end, one usually gets treated as one acts. So it'd be surprising if allies *don't* have their taps at every corner.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
RD, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:24pm

This needs to be in all-caps, my apologies in advance
WHY THE FUCK DO THEY NEED TO SCOOP UP *ALL* DATA FROM EVERY SOURCE ON THE PLANET IF THEY CAN'T CATCH SHIT LIKE THIS????

I mean, FUCKING seriously. DO NOT ask for blanket surveilence permission if you CAN'T CATCH THE BAD GUYS.

Protip: The American Citizens en masse are NOT the "bad guys."
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 2:45pm

Extraordinary claims...
...require extraordinary proof. At present, there is no proof, not even ordinary proof, on the table that this actually happened. Therefore it may be dismissed as fiction.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 4:00pm

I bet they used the Front Door everyone's been talking about.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 5:25pm

Oh Noes !!!
Hackers had access to the We The People website
This means war!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Vegemite_sanga (profile), 29 Oct 2014 @ 6:36pm

Terrorist watch is working
I can guess what happened, some computer a was trawling through mass surveillance data and flagged the phrase, "this single glorious act will send their country back to the stone age".

At this point they realised a draft copy of the TPP had been released - clearly the action of criminals since the government would never do that.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Oct 2014 @ 8:06pm

They left the Front Door open , must have misplaced that Golden Key.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
David, 29 Oct 2014 @ 11:24pm

Seriously?
But, it does seem profoundly odd that it was discovered by some other country.

Not at all. We all know the NSA guys just love to be telling the technical "truth" hopping with glee when questioned. Wiretapping all the Whitehouse and Congress traffic would not sit well with some of the "leaders" in there.

So they let their friends technically do that (likely providing the infrastructure for it and physically applying the taps in the course of a cooperation program, only actually calling it "tapping" for some occult combination of things not coming together here) while handing them all the traffic to and from their respective parliaments in return.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Coyne Tibbets (profile), 29 Oct 2014 @ 11:24pm

This is a surprise?
What part of NSA-is-military-intelligence didn't you understand?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 30 Oct 2014 @ 3:19am

programs/apps continually updated, that detects, informs and eventually block intrusions........THATS "CyberSecurity".......defencesive security that we should ALL have........so what the the hell have they been doing.

Defensive security, gets no where near enough attention hence inovation......imagine app/program thats designed for cases like these, thas higly compatible with the majority of devices out their, continually updated, created to be easilly implemented by programer, to patch any past, present future vulnrabilities

Thats DEFENSIVE security..........what the hell have they been doing

Oh right, OFFENSIVE security, i.e. the very thing that creates the need for DEFENSIVE security in the first place
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
amoshias (profile), 30 Oct 2014 @ 5:53am

It seems much more likely...
that a group was infiltrated/arrested/whatever and evidence of a white house hack was found, than that someone else is watching the white house's network, discovered something, and told us.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 30 Oct 2014 @ 8:00am

Funny how the more freedoms americans give up to make them safer, actually makes them less safe or in this case just goes to show just how incompetent those protecting their "freedoms" actually are.

No doubt some new bill will be made to combat this security breech by taking away more rights you guys have that will somehow fix the incompetence of those in charge.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
got_runs? (profile), 30 Oct 2014 @ 8:09am

Technology is not your friend.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- John Fenderson (profile), 30 Oct 2014 @ 8:25am
  
  Re:
  Of course not. It's a tool.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Reality bites, 1 Nov 2014 @ 8:33am

NSA... .. we now know the S stands for stupid or sloppy
The feral government is beyond stupid... they are monkeys.

Why is their Crime?.... inept gov, inept fbi, inept nsa.
They have all the info.... but none of the intelligence.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Stop Bush and Obama, 4 Nov 2014 @ 1:03am

Alternatively, ...
the "ally" in Kiev reported Russia breached the White House network to get the US to launch nukes Russia's way?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
eyesspy, 4 Nov 2014 @ 1:05am

test
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
eyesspy, 4 Nov 2014 @ 1:08am

Israel oh Israel, the all seeing eye which hears too. NASA is situated somewhere over there, America houses the shadow government.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
eyesspy, 4 Nov 2014 @ 1:11am

oops, I hear that it was the Russians who informed the Americans on Israel's breach of the White House computers
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
eyesspy, 4 Nov 2014 @ 1:20am

Now the Russians have informed the White House that they are prepared for any kind of war being brought to them from the Congress. i wish em all the best in the world in their endeavor to maintain a free and sovereign entity. It's most embarrassing to have to put it in such terms considering Russia has never considered itself under the thumb of America
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2014 @ 3:20pm

One reason why it might havebeen noticed by an ally would be if the intruders were probing or attacking the ally from the White House network. Which is something one would want to do if one wanted the White House to look really bad.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]