The president will nominate Kwan, a two-time Olympic medalist figure skater, to serve as U.S. ambassador to Belize. He’s tapping Kennedy to be ambassador to Australia.
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In disclosing their files had been hacked by HelloKitty, an Oregon medical outfit let it slip that the FBI calls them “a Ukrainian hacking group,” the first such revelation about the previously mysterious miscreants.
The Oregon Anesthesiology Group (OAG) came under cyber attack in July, with the hackers gaining access to the information of 522 current and former employees and some 750,000 patients. The FBI has since seized a HelloKitty account that contained some of the files, the OAG said in a breach disclosure statement.
An Oregon healthcare organization appears to have accidentally revealed in a breach disclosure that the FBI believes that the HelloKitty (FiveHands) ransomware gang operates out of Ukraine https://t.co/pcfbiky8W6
— The Record by Recorded Future (@TheRecord_Media) December 15, 2021
While the statement itself was made public on December 6, it was only noticed by the media on Wednesday, and only because it contained the revelation that the FBI considered the hackers Ukrainian.
According to the cybersecurity publication The Record, none of the previous alerts about the group, whether by US government organizations or private security firms, contained any hint about the gang’s location.
The HelloKitty ransomware, also known as FiveHands, was first noticed in January this year. Its most notable attack was against the Polish game developer CD Projekt Red – the studio behind ‘The Witcher’ series and ‘Cyberpunk 2077’ – in February.
In the note sent to OAG on October 21, the FBI said the hackers most likely exploited a vulnerability in the third-party firewall to gain access to the network. The ransomware attack reportedly forced OAG to restore their systems from backups and rebuild their entire infrastructure from scratch.
According to OAG, the hackers potentially made off with patient names, addresses, appointment dates, medical record numbers, insurance ID numbers, and diagnosis and procedure codes. They also potentially accessed current and former employee data, including names, addresses, Social Security numbers and tax information on file.
MEXICO CITY, Dec 15 (IPS) – The effects of the covid-19 pandemic and high energy prices have had an impact on the consumption of polluting fuels in Latin America and the Caribbean, exacerbating energy poverty in the region.
The International Rescue Committee, an aid group, says Afghanistan tops the countries of concern list for the next year. And the global picture for humanitarian workers is getting more challenging.
Iran has decided to bolster its traditional threats against archrival Israel with visual materials, publishing a map of the Jewish state marked with numerous possible targets Tehran could hit in response to its foe’s aggression.
An article with the attention-grabbing headline “Just one wrong move!” appeared in state-run English-language newspaper the Tehran Times on Tuesday.
“An intensification of the Israeli military threats against Iran seems to suggest that the Zionist regime has forgotten that Iran is more than capable of hitting them from anywhere,” the authors of the piece suggested.
Alongside the warning was a map of Israel, almost entirely covered with red pins symbolizing possible targets Iranian missiles could strike.
Read Iran’s severe warning to Israel in tomorrow’s edition of Tehran Times.
Also, read about the latest status of #ViennaTalks.
The article also cited the chief of general staff of Iran’s Armed Forces, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, who insisted that “our forces have never underestimated the threat of the enemy and are prepared for the smallest of threats in the strategic field.”
“At the strategic level, we do not intend to strike anyone, but at the operational and tactical level we are ready for a decisive response and a quick and tough offensive against the enemy,” he stressed, apparently referring to Israel.
The Iranian ballistic missile attack on a US base in western Iraq in January 2020 and the downing of an American Global Hawk drone over the Strait of Hormuz in June 2019 have proven Tehran’s capabilities, Bagheri insisted.
The Tehran Times pointed out that Israel has intensified its activities, as talks to revive the landmark 2015 Iranian nuclear deal between Tehran and the world powers restart after a break in Vienna.
The moves by Israel the paper considered the most concerning were: continuing Israeli air raids on targets in Syria, which relies on Tehran’s help in fighting terrorists; the reported calls by Israeli military and intelligence for the US to clamp down on the Iranian ballistic missile program; and the planned IDF drills in the Mediterranean that would simulate an attack on Iran.
“Keep your hands off!” the authors of the article wrote in conclusion.
