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| DATE | 2021-03-31 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
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| SUBJECT | Subject: [Hangout - NYLXS] deadly subjects
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https://www.wsj.com/articles/rubio-calls-for-rare-earth-industrial-policy-11615242218
Massive Hacks Linked to Russia, China Exploited U.S. Internet Security Gap
Protecting U.S. networks from cyberattacks launched domestically emerges
as an intelligence blind spot, security experts say

Foreign hackers are turning to U.S. servers as a launchpad. Last week,
Microsoft said a Chinese hacking group targeted servers running its
Exchange software.
PHOTO: TOBY SCOTT/ZUMA PRESS
By Dustin Volz and Robert McMillan
Updated March 10, 2021 12:15 pm ET
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U.S. lawmakers and security experts are voicing concern that foreign
governments are staging cyberattacks using servers in the U.S., in an
apparent effort to avoid detection by America’s principal
cyberintelligence organization, the National Security Agency.
When hackers recently targeted servers running Microsoft Corp.’s MSFT
1.69% widely used Exchange software, they employed U.S.-based computers
from at least four service providers to mount their attack, according to
an analysis by the threat intelligence company DomainTools LLC.
The attack that Microsoft disclosed last week affected at least tens of
thousands of customers and has been linked by the software giant and
other security researchers to China-based hackers. The Chinese Embassy
in Washington on Tuesday didn’t directly address the charge that China
was behind the Microsoft hack and referred to earlier comments from
Beijing in which the government said it “opposes and combats
cyberattacks and cyber thefts in all forms.”
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Security Experts Concerned Hackers Are Exploiting U.S. Security Gap

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It is the second major suspected nation-state hack unearthed in the past
few months to have employed U.S. servers as a launchpad. Suspected
Russian hackers used U.S.-based cloud services to support key stages of
their attack that leveraged a hack at SolarWinds Corp. , the Austin,
Texas, network software provider through which they penetrated U.S.
government and corporate networks. In both cases, the hacks were
disclosed by private-sector researchers, not the U.S. government.
The NSA, with its tens of thousands of employees, is one of the main
U.S. government organizations responsible for protecting the U.S. in
cyberspace. It has vast surveillance powers, though is generally
prohibited from using them to collect intelligence on domestic targets,
including computer servers inside the U.S. maintained by American companies.
“The combination of these two attacks definitely has pushed us to a
tipping point in terms of the policy makers and the executive branch
recognizing now that we need to do something,” said Glenn Gerstell,
former general counsel at the NSA.

Microsoft President Brad Smith.
PHOTO: DREW ANGERER/ASSOCIATED PRESS
The SolarWinds hackers used cloud-computing systems run by Microsoft and
Amazon.com Inc. to launch their attacks. At a Senate hearing last week,
Microsoft President Brad Smith said the method was of obvious appeal to
the Russians because it enabled them to circumvent U.S. intelligence
collection. Amazon declined to appear at the hearing, prompting
bipartisan ire from lawmakers, and hasn’t commented publicly on the use
of its data centers in the SolarWinds attack.
“This is a sophisticated actor that apparently took the time to research
legal authority. It knew that by operating from servers in the United
States, it could evade some of the U.S. government’s best threat
hunters,” Microsoft Corporate Vice President for customer security Tom
Burt said of the Exchange hack.
Based on the internet addresses used, the hack emanated from
lesser-known service providers such as DigitalOcean Inc., as well as
servers in Hong Kong, the Netherlands, China and other jurisdictions,
said Joe Slowik, a researcher with DomainTools. About half the servers
identified as connected to the Exchange hack were in the U.S., according
to the DomainTools analysis.
A Digital Ocean spokeswoman said that “illegal activity is not tolerated
on our platform.” The company, she said, takes action when misuse is
discovered, including working with government agencies if they are affected.
Security experts said Microsoft is caught in the middle of both attacks
in part because its products are ubiquitous. It is also a major software
provider to the U.S. government and large corporate clients, making
Microsoft software flaws appealing targets to hackers trying to spy on
U.S. networks, they said.

From the Archives
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Biden White House Faces Three Problems From Suspected Russian Hack
A suspected Russian cyberattack of the federal government has breached
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what the hack means for President Joe Biden's national security efforts.
Photo illustration: Laura Kammermann (Video from 12/23/20)
The Microsoft Exchange attacks were carried out by at least four hacking
groups, all of which have been linked to China, said Alexis
Dorais-Joncas, a researcher with ESET, a security company that has been
tracking the attack.
The attackers may have had other motivations, beyond skirting NSA
detection, to use U.S.-based servers, Messrs. Slowik and Dorais-Joncas
said. They may have been trying to improve the performance of their
software or to avoid security tools that, for example, would block
connections originating from China, they said.
Earlier this week, an anonymous hacker posted “proof of concept” code to
the internet that could be used by other hacking groups to conduct
further attacks on unpatched Microsoft Exchange servers. An internet
scan conducted by search-engine company Shodan LLC this week has found
more than 70,000 Exchange servers vulnerable to attack. Most of the
entities hit by the widespread China-linked attack were law firms,
higher-education facilities, or entities conducting research on
infectious diseases, said James Alliband, a cybersecurity strategist
with business-software provider VMware Inc.
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
What steps should lawmakers take in response to cyberattacks? Join the
conversation below.
Even before the Exchange hack emerged, U.S. lawmakers from both parties
were looking for ways to bolster U.S. cyber defenses, including reviving
an oft-stalled effort to create a national data-breach notification law.
At a Congressional hearing last month on the SolarWinds hack, several
senators asked tech company executives whether gaps in the ability to
monitor domestic infrastructure created opportunities for malicious
actors to evade potential detection by U.S. intelligence agencies.

Any attempt to write new laws granting the NSA or other intelligence
services domestic surveillance authority would likely face sharp
resistance from privacy advocates, who have long worried that new powers
would lead to abuses. The NSA has been reluctant to be seen as expanding
its espionage capabilities ever since the 2013 disclosures by Edward
Snowden that revealed classified details about its domestic and
international surveillance programs established following the Sept. 11,
2001, terrorist attacks, former officials have said.
“The government already has the authority to watch every bit of data
going in and out of federal networks,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.).
“Some in the government now want to ask for new, warrantless
surveillance of Americans’ communications to distract Congress from
asking unpleasant questions.”
Mr. Wyden added that America’s “$6 billion cyber shield failed to stop
or detect the hacks.” The senator was referencing Einstein, a
cyber-threat detection system used by the government to try to thwart
hacking attempts by finding known malware. Einstein lacks the capacity
to identify malware not previously seen in attacks.
That view has detractors, though. “It can’t possibly be the case that
the Fourth Amendment ties our hands in such a way that we just have to
sit there and watch the Chinese romp through our infrastructure,” said
Mr. Gerstell, the former NSA top lawyer, referring to the U.S.
Constitution’s protection of privacy against unreasonable searches.
Mr. Gerstell said it was unlikely that Congress would ever grant such
authorities directly to the NSA and that an alternate proposal involving
a different agency could be more palatable.
The NSA declined to comment and referred questions to the White House
National Security Council, which didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The Senate Intelligence Committee is slated to receive separate
briefings this week on the Microsoft Exchange hack from the Biden
administration and Microsoft, a committee aide said.
“I think we’re going to be struggling for a long time to understand the
scope and the scale of what has happened here,” said Katie Moussouris,
the chief executive of Luta Security Inc.
Write to Dustin Volz at dustin.volz-at-wsj.com and Robert McMillan at
Robert.Mcmillan-at-wsj.com
https://www.wsj.com/articles/massive-hacks-linked-to-russia-china-exploited-u-s-internet-security-gap-11615380912
Rubio Calls for Rare-Earth Industrial Policy
Today, the U.S. is largely dependent on China’s government-backed
rare-earth manufacturing industry.
March 8, 2021 5:23 pm ET
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A dump truck moves raw ore inside the pit at the Mountain Pass mine,
operated by MP Materials, in Mountain Pass, Calif., June 7, 2019.
PHOTO: JOE BUGLEWICZ/BLOOMBERG NEWS
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Rare-earth minerals are integral to many of America’s most important
advanced manufacturing industries. Hard drives, electric vehicles,
critical defense technologies and countless other consumer devices all
require them. Today, the U.S. is largely dependent on China’s
government-backed rare-earth manufacturing industry. Such a reliance
poses serious national and economic security concerns. Yet your
editorial (“Rare Truths About China’s Rare Earths,” March 4) plays down
the risks and oversimplifies what is needed to restart and sustain a
domestic rare-earth mining industry, suggesting the failure to do so
boils down to environmental regulations.
I have long supported slashing overly burdensome regulations. But in
this case, the holdup has far more to do with the expensive startup
costs associated with rare-earth mineral refinement and metallurgy, as
well as the fear that, once up and running, Beijing will undercut the
market through massive subsidies that would end up crushing the ability
of private American companies to compete. That’s not a problem we can
solve solely by cutting regulations.
Thankfully, solutions exist. My RE-Coop 21st Century Manufacturing Act
would convene private-market actors to establish a rare-earth
cooperative. This arrangement would focus the power of America’s free
enterprise and defend our national security in the process.

When we talk about an international “free market,” we have to remember
that the Chinese Communist Party is a player with ambitions to overtake
America as the world’s strongest nation. Competing on such an unlevel
playing field will require ingenuity in our policymaking to defend
American firms and workers from manipulations of the market by China.
--
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town
that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://www.mrbrklyn.com
DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
http://www.brooklyn-living.com
Being so tracked is for FARM ANIMALS and extermination camps,
but incompatible with living as a free human being. -RI Safir 2013
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