Former White House cyber official: Russia behind ‘largest’ cyberattack against US

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Former White House adviser Richard Clarke revealed on Thursday that Russia is behind the cyberattacks faced by the federal government.
• Aside from the government, US companies were also at risk of getting jeopardized.
• Former Trump Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert also gave a warning about the alleged Russian espionage efforts.

During his exclusive interview on The Lead with Jake Tapper on Thursday, former presidential advisor Richard Clarke exposed reports that the US government is facing tremendous cyber-attacks from Russia.

In his introductory sharing to Jake Tapper, the former top aide of President George W. Bush directly said: “This is the largest espionage attack in history.”

“This is as though the Russians got a passkey, a skeleton key for about half the locks in the country. Think about it that way. It’s 18,000 companies and government institutions scattered around the U.S. And the world. This is an espionage attack,” he continued.

The US government thinks that Russia is behind the cyberattacks, but it still not verified.

Clarke also emphasized the implications of such cyberattack, noting that various US companies were also at risk of being compromised.

“So, what can the Russians, assuming that it was they who are, in fact, behind this, what can they do with the information they have? What’s the risk here?” Tapper asked.

“Well, they did not get into classified, secret, or top-secret networks yet, as far as we know,” Clarke replied, adding that “they found whatever you can find on an unclassified network in the federal department. Some of that is interesting and some of that, combined with classified information, will tell you something.”

For Clarke, the real threat, which could be inevitable in the future, was that if Russia could steal pertinent data and bribe the country to negotiate its own agenda.

“They can put a knife to our throat say, ‘You want to retaliate? You want to do something in Syria? You want to do something in Ukraine? How would you like 18,000 of your companies wiped out, all of their networks wiped out?’” he explained.

In response to the potential threat, Clarke offered his piece of advice: “But what we really need to do now is to say to the Russians, this is out of bounds. This is is too much. This is indiscriminate.”

Before ending, he told Tapper that “the only way they’ll take that seriously” was to “hurt them.”

In connection with the alleged Russian espionage, former Trump Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert was the first to publicize such claim.

“The magnitude of this ongoing attack is hard to overstate,” he wrote in the New York Times op-ed on Thursday. “President Trump is on the verge of leaving behind a federal government, and perhaps a large number of major industries, compromised by the Russian government.”

Other reports have also emerged, suggesting that the country’s nuclear warhead stockpile could have been infiltrated.

Source: Mediate.com