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Reports that White House e-mail system used in UK cyberattack

Federal Computer Week: “The White House’s unclassified e-mail system is back up after an eight-hour outage, but the e-mail security problems may go deeper. It was disclosed February 4, 2011 that some officials alleged White House e-mails were the source of a cyberattack against British officials two months ago. Officials from the United Kingdom said today that alleged White House e-mail accounts were the source of a malware attack against U.K. government officials in late December, according to news report.”

  • “The UK Government highlighted attacks upon UK cyberspace as a priority risk in its National Security Strategy published in October 2010. The setting for the Foreign Secetary’s speech is the 47th Munich Security Conference on 4 February. The UK delegation is led by Prime Minister David Cameron. [Read Foreign Secretary’s speech in full – snipped here: “Government systems are being targeted too. ZEUS is a well-known piece of malware that attempts to steal banking information and other personal details. In late December a spoofed email purporting to be from the White House was sent to a large number of international recipients who were directed to click on a link that then downloaded a variant of ZEUS. The UK Government was targeted in this attack and a large number of emails bypassed some of our filters. Our experts were able to clear up the infection, but more sophisticated attacks such as these are becoming more common.”
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