This feels like someone in Iran studied the Khashoggi murder as a masterclass in how to handle dissidents living on US soil
From the indictment of four Iranian intelligence officials charged with conspiracy to kidnap an Iranian journalist author and human rights activist based in Brooklyn, and take that person back to Iran, "where the victim’s fate would have been uncertain at best"
Note this from the indictment: "Farahani and his network procured the services of private investigators to surveil, photograph and video record Victim-1 and Victim-1’s household members in Brooklyn....
"Farahani’s network procured days’ worth of surveillance at Victim-1’s home and the surrounding area, videos and photographs of the victim’s family and associates, surveillance of the victim’s residence, and the installation of and access to a live high-def video feed of ...home"
"The network procured the surveillance [of private investigators] by misrepresenting their identities and the purpose of the surveillance to the investigators, and laundered money into the US from Iran to pay for the surveillance."
Indictment doesn't say who journalist/author/activist is, but court doc indicates person actively protested Iranian women being forced to wear a hijab. That descrip fits Brooklyn-based journalist Masih Alinejad who sued Iranian gov in 2019 for harassment apnews.com/article/religi…
Masih Alinejad accused Iran of trying to use her brother to lure her to Turkey and kidnap her - which matches info laid out in court doc published today (justice.gov/opa/press-rele…) which says Iran tried to use target's family to lure them to third country en.radiofarda.com/a/brother-of-a…
Court document says the brother of kidnapping target was arrested in 2019, and that also matches what happened with Masih Alinejad's brother
And here's an op-ed written by Brooklyn-based Iran-born journalist Masih Alinejad, and published last August in the Washington Post, talking about Iranian officials threatening to kidnap her over her anti-hijab activism washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…
Brooklyn-based, Iranian-born journalist @AlinejadMasih has confirmed that she was target of Iranian kidnapping plot. Here she says in vid that police have been outside her house the last two weeks. She also says they only guard her from 5am-midnight.

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More from @KimZetter

6 Jul
Chair of the Federal Reserve and CEOs of the largest US banks said in recent months that their biggest concern is a cyberattack against the financial sector. I wrote about what could happen if a systemic cyberattack targeted the financial sector. nytimes.com/2021/07/03/bus…
Experts say country is not prepared for a systemic cyberattack on Wall Street if it targets core institutions/infrastructure that provide key services. "[E]everybody believes an institution can be taken out... What we don’t know is how bad it would get and how fast,” experts said
Financial sector could withstand one large institution being knocked ou, but if multiple ones shut down, disruption could last wks. If attackers struck on a “triple witching” Friday when stock options/stock index futures/stock index options all expire, effects would be amplified.
Read 4 tweets
11 Jun
Israeli TV says blasts that damaged the Natanz uranium enrichment plant in Iran in April was a supply-chain attack. Operatives supplied Iran with the marble platforms on which the centrifuges stand, and the marble was embedded with explosives. apnews.com/article/united…
"Media in Israel [have] to clear stories involving security matters through military censors. That Cohen’s remarks apparently cleared the censors suggests Israel wanted to issue a new warning to Iran amid the Vienna nuclear negotiations."
It's confusing which incident Israel TV is referring to. There were explosions at Natanz in July 2020 and April 2021. The 2020 incident involved fire; 2021 incident included explosion but mostly took out electricity. Here's my story about 2021 incident: zetter.substack.com/p/sabotage-at-…
Read 4 tweets
8 Jun
Really thoughtful explanation from @propublica about why they're publishing tax info for the wealthiest Americans, which they received from an anonymous source. They considered that the info might come from "a state actor hostile to American interests." propublica.org/article/why-we…
"Many will ask about the ethics of publishing such private data. We are doing so—quite selectively and carefully—because we believe it serves the public interest in fundamental ways...[to disclose] tax returns of ppl like Jeff Bezos, Michael Bloomberg, Warren Buffett, Elon Musk"
"While the revelations in today’s story are extraordinary, the procedures..used in assessing the data’s value are standard..nearly everyone who provides material to a reporter is doing so in ways that reflect their...agenda....those motives are irrelevant if the info is reliable"
Read 4 tweets
7 Jun
DoJ announces that it has found and recaptured the majority of the ransom that Colonial Pipeline paid.
They seized the money from a bitcoin wallet.
"We identified a virtual currency wallet that the Darkside actors used to collect payment.... Victim funds were seized from that wallet preventing Darkside actors from using it."
Read 6 tweets
3 Jun
Adding to previous reports that DoJ had seized phone records of WaPo reporters, the NYT now says DoJ also secretly seized phone records of four NYT reporters spanning Jan 14-Apr 30, 2017: Matt Apuzzo, Adam Goldman, Eric Lichtblau and Michael S. Schmidt. nytimes.com/2021/06/02/us/…
In addition to phone records, DoJ also secured a court order to seize logs — but not contents — of the reporters' emails, but “no records" were actually obtained using the order. The Biden admin has since avowed that it will not seize journo records for leak investigations.
DoJ didn't say which article was being investigated but the NYT says it appears to be related to classified info reported in an April 22, 2017 article the reporters wrote about how James Comey "handled politically charged investigations during the 2016 presidential election."
Read 6 tweets
25 May
This has gotten a lot of attention in last months and people have tried to bring me into the argument because my book states that Stuxnet used 5 zero-days (one patched before Stuxnet launched so only 4 at time of launch). Liam, Eric and I disagree on what constitutes a 0-day.
They say a hard-coded password that Siemens placed in its system was a 0-day because Stuxnet exploited it. I use the conventional definition of a 0-day as something the vendor doesn't know about and has therefore had 0-days to patch it....
The hardcoded password was intentionally placed there by Siemens, and even after Stuxnet was discovered exploiting it, Siemens warned customers not to change the password or the system wouldn't work. That's not a 0-day to me. Eric, Liam and I laugh about it and agree to disagree.
Read 5 tweets

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