The initial – and most important – finding was that Sky ECC used two servers, and traffic between those wasn't encrypted. More on some of the data this yielded in this thread on metadata.
x.com/hatr/status/1849047551…
Sky used a myriad of methods to encrypt their data, e.g. one (encrypted) key was stored only on the server, deleted from the phone's memory and requested when needed. Alongside TLS etc.
One key aspect was that the traffic between the servers of Sky ECC, sitting at OVH in France, was unencrypted. This enabled law enforcement to wiretap all and listen in passively.
Story in 🇩🇪 at @derStandardatderstandard.at/story/3000000…
This would prove extremely helpful later on, for hacking all of the devices, but for now it put them into the position of having access to a lot of information right out the gate. One thing they could see. Queries to the SQL-database.
The hackers started back in 2010, with initial mapping of the infrastructure and then, until 2015, tried to siphon data out of VW networks – repeatedly and successfully so. Even though VW removed the hackers, they kept coming back.
zdf.de/nachrichten/wirtschaf…
Kimsuky starts out by casually asking questions, gaining your trust. Then comes malware. Now, they've widened their scope to also go after defense companies, as described in an joint warning by German and South Korean domestic intelligence agencies.
zdf.de/nachrichten/digitales…
Described in the alert is a case of #Kimsuky hacking a defense research center. North KOrea has prioritized strengthening its naval power and the hackers executed a supply-chain-attack through a website maintenance
company
Titled “Information confrontation in World politics”, Serebriakov lays out his worldview, describing how 🇷🇺 is on the defensive and has to protect itself against the West. Controlling flows of information is one way of doing that, he writes.
At times, Serebriakov’s writing made it seem like he was in awe of what he clearly thinks the U.S. is capable of. At other times, he adopts conspiratorial thinking. The thesis dates back to 2019, so is pre-war.
derstandard.de/consent/tcf/s…
When asked if they're running this account, one intelligence agency analyst laughed: "We'd love to take credit", they said. But in their telling, it wasn't them.
In the #Vulkanfiles, we can see references to "Znatok", e.g. somebody installs a virtual machine called "znatok-flat.vdmk". But not much more. So "Znatok" remains a mystery, very much like m4lwatch.