A new set of documents purportedly lifted from the US National Security Agency (NSA) suggests that American spies have burrowed deep into the Middle East’s financial network, apparently compromising the Dubai office of the anti-money laundering and financial services firm EastNets.
In addition, there was bad news in the release for Microsoft, and users still running versions of Microsoft’s operating system earlier than Windows 10.
Kevin Beaumont, who was one of several experts who spent Friday combing through the documents and trying out the code, said the malicious code published Friday appeared to exploit previously undiscovered weaknesses in older versions of its Windows operating system – the mark of a sophisticated actor and a potential worry for many of Windows’ hundreds of millions of users.
The opinion was seconded by Matthew Hickey of Prestbury, England-based cybersecurity company Hacker House.
“It’s an absolute disaster,” Hickey said in an email. “I have been able to hack pretty much every Windows version here in my lab using this leak.”
Microsoft said in a statement that it is reviewing the leak and “will take the necessary actions to protect our customers.” It declined to elaborate.
The NSA, which did not respond to emails, has previously shown interest in targeting SWIFT, according to documents leaked by former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, and Suiche said other documents in the release suggested an effort to monitor the world’s financial transactions that went beyond EastNets.
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