From PCMag.com: Anonymous said Thursday morning that it had breached the databases of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and was sitting on about 1GB of data.
"Yes, #NATO was breached. And we have lots of restricted material. With some simple injection. In the next days, wait for interesting data," the grouptweeted via the @AnonymousIRC feed.
The group said it "cannot" publish most of the data because that "would be irresponsible." This morning, it did post a link to a restricted NATO PDF, which Anonymous said related to the outsourcing of a communications and information system in Kosovo in 2008, but the doc crashed because of too many connections. Last night, it posted a 2007 document about a similar IT project in Afghanistan.
A NATO spokesman told the Telegraph that it is investigating the claims.
The move comes about two months after NATO called out Anonymous in a draft general report about information and national security. That report noted that "Anonymous is becoming more and more sophisticated and could potentially hack into sensitive government, military, and corporate files."
NATO pointed to Anonymous’ February hack of HBGary Federal, which happened days after the firm’s then-CEO Aaron Barr told the Financial Times that he knew and planned to expose the identities of leaders behind the Anonymous collective. The subsequent Anonymous attack resulted in the defacing of Barr’s online networking profiles and exposure of 71,800 e-mails at AnonLeaks, prompting Barr’s resignation.
"It remains to be seen how much time Anonymous has for pursuing such paths," NATO concluded. "The longer these attacks persist the more likely countermeasures will be developed, implemented, the groups will be infiltrated and perpetrators persecuted."
In response, Anonymous said NATO and HBGary Federal were corrupt. "If the government was doing nothing underhand or illegal, there would be nothing ’embarassing’ about Wikileaks revelations, nor would there have been any scandal emanating from HBGary," Anonymous said at the time. "Our message is simple: do not lie to the people and you won’t have to worry about your lies being exposed."
Anonymous also warned NATO not to "make the mistake of challenging Anonymous."
The organization apparently did not heed that warning in Anonymous’ eyes. "Hi NATO. Yes we haz more of your delicious data. You wonder where from? No hints, your turn. You call it war; we laugh at your battleships," Anonymous tweeted later this morning.
From The Telegraph:
A Nato spokesman said the organisation was investigating Anonymous’ claims.
"NATO is aware that a hackers group has released what it claims to be NATO classified documents on the internet," he said.
"NATO security experts are investigating these claims. We strongly condemn any leak of classified documents, which can potentially endanger the security of NATO Allies, armed forces and citizens."
The action follows a report for Nato by Lord Jopling, published in June, which suggested the hackers were a threat to society and would be caught.
“Today, the ad hoc international group of hackers and activists is said to have thousands of operatives and has no set rules or membership," said the report.
"It remains to be seen how much time Anonymous has for pursuing such paths. The longer these attacks persist the more likely countermeasures will be developed, implemented, the groups will be infiltrated and perpetrators persecuted."
Graphic: Telegraph