US digital giant Meta announced on Friday that it had blocked a series of WhatsApp accounts that it believed were linked to an Iranian hacking group and which it believes targeted political leaders close to US President Joe Biden or his predecessor Donald Trump.
According to Meta, these numbers were used to approach people in several countries besides the United States, particularly in ” Israel, Palestine, Iran and the United Kingdom ».
« Their efforts appeared to focus on political and diplomatic officials and public figures, including some associated with the administrations of President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump. “, the group assured in a press release.
Former Cryptocurrency Critic Donald Trump to Launch Dedicated Platform
The investigation carried out would have made it possible to go back to the APT42 group, ” an Iranian cyber threat known for its campaigns using simple phishing techniques to steal people’s access “The APT42 group is associated with the Revolutionary Guards, the ideological army of the Islamic Republic of Iran, according to Google.
Meta had already linked the group in a previous investigation to attempts to target human rights defenders in Iran and Israel, politicians in the United States and researchers and journalists specializing in Iran around the world.
Attacks are increasing
Among the techniques used, the hackers pretended to be technical support from the access provider AOL, Yahoo!, Google or Microsoft. Meta specifies that it was alerted by reports sent by some of the people targeted, estimating moreover that none of the intrusion attempts bore fruit.
This is not the first time that Iran has been accused of attempting to hack politicians during the election campaign and as the November 5 presidential elections approach. This week was notably marked by the Democratic Convention, at the end of which Vice President Kamala Harris was officially nominated to face Donald Trump in the race for the White House.
US presidential election: dates to remember
OpenAI had alerted on August 16 that ChatGPT had been used to produce content, particularly related to the elections, by an Iranian group, identified as Storm-20235, seeking to carry out an influence operation, specifying that the content had reached a limited audience.
OpenAI linked this operation to the one revealed on August 9 by Microsoft, also of Iranian origin, which combined the creation of fake news sites, cyberattacks and hacks, as well as fake accounts on social networks, which sometimes went so far as to try to intimidate or incite violence against political figures.
Tehran rejects accusations
Donald Trump’s campaign team, for its part, claimed on August 10 that it had suffered a hack, accusing ” foreign sources “, and pointing the finger at the Middle Eastern country. We have seen more aggressive activities from Iran during this election cycle. ” reacted in a joint press release from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).
The specialized media Politico had previously said he had received emails containing information about the Republican candidate’s campaign from a source who declined to identify himself, with U.S. authorities confirming that the source was indeed linked to Iran.
On August 13, Kamala Harris’ campaign team also said it had been targeted by foreign hackers. Iran’s mission to the United Nations then rejected these ” allegations ” as ” uncorroborated and without any foundation ».
« As we have previously announced, the Islamic Republic of Iran has neither the intention nor the motive to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. ” she said in a statement sent to AFP.
A Google team responsible for analyzing online threats confirmed on the 14th that an Iranian-affiliated hacking group, APT42, was targeting the campaigns of the two candidates by attacking the personal email accounts of their collaborators but also by contacting them by posing as journalists.
In 2016, Democratic Party emails were also hacked. The leak revealed internal communications involving Hillary Clinton, who ran against Donald Trump. The Republican billionaire, who won the presidential election that year, was criticized for encouraging the data hack, which was attributed to Russia. US intelligence later concluded that Russia had influenced the 2016 election in Trump’s favor, which Trump denies.
(With AFP)
