The swift folder contains PowerPoint slides suggesting that the Middle East network used by the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) for financial transactions was targeted by the NSA, according to a blog post by Microsoft Most Valuable Professional Matt Suiche. While Microsoft always acknowledges the source of security flaw reports, the grugq noticed there are no acknowledgements for patches (MS17-010) issued last month that fix some of the leaked NSA exploits.
What originally appeared to be one of the most damaging releases in recent memory of "zero-day" exploits, or hacking tools that take advantage of previously unknown software vulnerabilities, fell from the sky with the shrieking ferocity of a MOAB bomb and landed with the soft thud of a dud.
They "suggest the NSA was targeting the SWIFT banking system of several banks around the world". SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) is a service used by global banks across the globe when transferring funds.
The NSA's move allowed it to monitor money flows among some Middle Eastern and Latin American banks.
"I'll bet it's not the only SWIFT service bureau that's been compromised", he said. Belgium-based SWIFT on Friday downplayed the risk of attacks employing the code released by hackers and said it had no evidence that the main SWIFT network had ever been accessed without authorization. Curiously, despite the detailed information released, EastNets put out a statement claiming its systems are secure.
"The reports of an alleged hacker-compromised EastNets Service Bureau network is totally false and unfounded".
"While we cannot ascertain the information that has been published, we can confirm that no EastNets customer data has been compromised in any way", said the EastNets founder and chief executive Hazem Mulhim in a statement sent to The National. This got security researchers across the globe extremely anxious and some even suggested Windows users to just turn off their machines for the weekend (and maybe turn them on to fix the issues!? lol).And now, even though Redmond has confirmed that it has patched all exploits, they're looking closely at four of the exploits which were patched just last month - via monthly update patch cycle.
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Here are some things found in the dump.
Since Microsoft no longer issues patches for operating systems prior to Windows 7, some of the hacking tools will forever work on out-of-date computers, including those that run Windows Vista, Windows XP and other versions.
The opinion was seconded by Matthew Hickey of UK-based cybersecurity company Hacker House.
"It's an absolute disaster", he told the Associated Press. It declined to elaborate.
No one has yet discovered the identity of Shadow Brokers, or of the hackers that gained access to the NSA materials.
As it happened in the middle of previous year, the well-known group of hackers Shadow Brokers are carrying out a series of operations since the last few days.
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