Thread by @MollyMcKew

Today, more detail was revealed by CISA about extensive Russian cyber intrusions in US election/critical systems

The indictment of GRU hackers released Monday is a roadmap to understanding what Russian can do on Election Day

New on @RenewGreatPower /1

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On Monday, DoJ unsealed the indictment of 6 hackers from Russia’s GRU for “worldwide deployment of destructive malware and other disruptive actions in cyberspace.” /2

justice.gov/opa/pr/six-rus…

It connected the dots between a wide array of cyberattacks over the past 5 years, which happened in France, Ukraine, Georgia, South Korea, the US, and the UK.

The indictment made clear that a multi-nation intelligence effort helped attribute these attacks to the GRU /3

The broad range of activities attributed to Sandworm shows how much leeway these units are given by the Kremlin to probe and beta-test and operationalize different kinds of cyber weapons to expansively contribute to Russia’s strategic (and petty) objectives within parameters. /4

Key takeaways of the new GRU indictment:

1) tracking Russian activity is a top priority

2) Russia is willing to use disproportionate responses to retaliate against perceived slights

3) Russian behavior has not been deterred or altered by any response they have met thus far /5

4) The list of operational targets is a road map for what could happen on Election Day (or beyond)

5) private-sector & individual targets are seen as interchangeable with national targets

6) They tried to look like other hackers to hide the attribution of their attacks /6

7) far-right US media/personalities keep finding themselves as the amplification network for GRU-obtained materials — but how?

8) so much for the “patriotic hackers” bullsh*t

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What are the potential targets for Russian hackers, based in the details in the indictment?

-Low-level elex interference (last minute hack-and-leak operations etc)
- Disrupting govt information systems, which could relate directly to elections or not ... /8

-Disrupting power grids
-Disrupting banking systems/payment systems
-Disrupting govt services and systems, or creating the perception of system vulnerabilities
-Creating the perception of widespread internet disruption
- Targeted technical attacks on media organizations ... /9

-Disrupting hospital databases, which can disrupt or delay the delivery of care
-Disrupting shipping, transportation, aviation, and other essential infrastructure
-the CISA announcement today mentioned education systems, which would be a remote learning nightmare, no doubt /10

We know Russian interference efforts are ongoing, we know how much importance they put in the cyber toolkit, and we should have every expectation that at least some of these options are well-prepared for use on US targets.
/11

Americans are wound pretty tight. We’re prepped to believe that someone will do something to disrupt the conduct of the elex, tallying of results, transition of power. It wouldn’t take very much to create the perception, or reality, of chaos

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