By Aaron Miller-
The Russian group linked to the hacking of Hillary Clinton’s presidential election campaign has launched fresh attacks in the US, including against two conservative thinktanks, in the run-up to the midterm elections, according to Microsoft.
Microsoft say they have unearthed new attempts by Russian hackers, who have created fake websites to mimic the Hudson Institute and the International Republican Institute- two rightwing thinktanks broadly allied against U.S Donald Trump. Three other fake domains were also designed to resemble those belonging to the US Senate the technology giant said.
The hacking attacks are being attributed to a group called Strontium, known to other security firms as Fancy Bear and APT28. The group was previously linked to the email hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign. U.S special counsel Robert Mueller, Fancy Bear has ties to the Russian intelligence agency, the GRU.
Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president, said: “We’re concerned that these and other attempts pose security threats to a broadening array of groups connected with both American political parties in the run-up to the 2018 elections.”
84 fake websites associated with Fancy Bear over the past two years have been shut down by obtaining court orders to transfer control of the domains. As to where responsibility for the hacking attacks lay, Smith said: “We have no doubt in our minds.” The claims are a further stain on the reputation of Russia, who would do well to disprove the allegations which most will find difficult to disbelieve.
The fake websites are believed to have been designed to mimic the company’s login pages for tools such as email, calendar and document sharing, with web addresses such as “hudsonorg-my-sharepoint.com” and “adfs-senate.email”. Individuals fooled by the site could be tricked into entering their username and password, enabling access their personal data. Moscow has always denied allegations they used hackers to influence U.S elections and political opinion.
Moscow has again unsurprisingly rejected Microsoft’s allegations and said there was no evidence to support them. “We don’t know what hackers they are talking about,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “Who exactly are they talking about? We don’t understand what the proof and the basis is for them drawing these kind of conclusions. Such information is lacking.” Evidence is always key to establishing any allegation, but in this case Microsoft
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The hackers so far appear to have been unsuccessful in persuading anyone to click on the fake websites, which could have exposed a target victim to computer infiltration, hidden surveillance and data theft. Both conservative thinktanks said they had tried to be vigilant about “spear-phishing” email attacks because their pro-democracy work had frequently drawn the ire of authoritarian governments.
“We’re glad that our work is attracting the attention of bad actors,” the Hudson Institute spokesman David Tell said. “It means we’re having an effect, presumably.”
The International Republican Institute is led by a board that includes six Republican senators and the prominent Russia critic and Senate hopeful Mitt Romney, who is running for a Utah seat.