They installed malware into an update for a SolarWinds product. What this attacker did was identify network management software from a company called SolarWinds. needs to strike back after SolarWinds hackīrad Smith: I think from a software engineering perspective, it's probably fair to say that this is the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen.īrad Smith: One of the really disconcerting aspects of this attack was the widespread and indiscriminate nature of it. And by all accounts, it's still going on. departments of Justice, State, Treasury, Energy, and Commerce and for nine months had unfettered access to top-level communications, court documents, even nuclear secrets. Russian spies went rummaging through the digital files of the U.S.

The attack was unprecedented in audacity and scope. Last March, with the coronavirus spreading uncontrollably across the United States, Russian cyber soldiers released their own contagion by sabotaging a tiny piece of computer code buried in a popular piece of software called 'SolarWinds.' The hidden virus spread to 18,000 government and private computer networks by way of one of those software updates we all take for granted. President Biden inherited a lot of intractable problems, but perhaps none is as disruptive as the cyber war between the United States and Russia simmering largely under the radar.

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