Author Archives: Denise Simon

With GPS, Drug Cartels Move Shipments to Europe Until

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Drug cartels heavily rely on GPS devices to track shipments, feds say

The GPS has increasingly become a drug dealer’s new partner in crime.

Drug-smuggling groups are relying on the device to keep tabs on drug packages as they wind their way through Central America to the United States, according to published reports.

The criminals attach the drug shipments to buoys, send them off in the Pacific Ocean, and use signals they give off to track a package’s location by using special codes, InSight Crimes reports.

The GPS gives dealers the advantage of having drug shipments picked up by others monitoring their movements without being detected by authorities.

GPS devices are also allowing drug cartels to keep track of lower-level smugglers to ensure they are doing what they were told, say U.S. officials.

Barbara L. Carreno, public affairs officer for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said drug dealers have been using the tracking device for years. But recently, as the once bulky devices have become smaller and cheaper, their use has increased, she said.

“Traffickers need to know that their mules are doing what they are supposed to do and delivering their very valuable shipments where they are supposed to go,” Carreno said. “We often find GPS devices in shipments we seize.”

Traffickers won’t use a computerized system that would lead law enforcement back to them or create records that would implicate them.

– Barbara L. Carreno, spokeswoman, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration

The GPS is simple enough, the DEA says, that it actually eludes more sophisticated tools used for drug interdictions by government agencies of various countries.

“Traffickers wouldn’t use a computerized system that would lead law enforcement back to them or create records that would implicate them,” Carreno said. “They want something cheap, unsophisticated and untraceable.”

Salvadoran officials say that Ecuadorean boatmen have become a core part of the criminal activity. They move the shipments to places off coasts of El Salvador, Guatemala and Costa Rica.

Once the shipments are left at certain locations in the Pacific, traffickers use the GPS to alert those waiting for them by sending information to mobile telephones and computers, the website said, citing the Salvadoran national police’s anti-narcotics division.

One of the most notorious drug kingpins, Ecuador’s Washington Prado Alava, was said by Colombian authorities to have run a highly sophisticated trafficking operation. But his operation, which moved 250 metric tons of cocaine to the United States over a four-year span, was dependent on GPS locators, Insight Crime reported. More here from FNC.

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Anti-drug forces from several European and American countries intercepted a total of eight tons of cocaine in a double bust that is being dubbed as one of the largest in history.

In the larger one, Spanish authorities cooperated with Ecuadorean police to intercept a ship off that Latin American country bringing more than 5.5 metric tons of cocaine to Spain.

The ship was loaded with Colombian cocaine in the Pacific and planned to travel through the Panama Canal and across the Atlantic to Europe, officials said in a statement.

Una operación de la junto a la de Ecuador ha permitido interceptar un buque con 5.529 kilos de cocaína y detener a 24 personas.

 

In a separate drug seizure, Spanish police stopped a Venezuela-flagged fishing vessel carrying 2.5 metric tons of cocaine near Martinica.

The ship was intercepted on May 4 and was towed to Las Palmas in Spain’s Canary Islands.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency and Britain’s National Crime Agency also took part in the joint operation.

The cargo seized off the coast of Ecuador has an estimated value of $250 million. Ecuadorean agents boarded it when it was almost three nautical miles off Santa Elena province.

Spain’s Interior Minister Juan Ignocio Zoido said to El Pais that the first operation resulted in the capture of 24 suspected drug traffickers.

“It is one of the largest cocaine seizures in history and it takes apart a large drug-trafficking organization between South America and Spain,” he said.

The massive operation began after Spain found out in January that a South American ring with links in Spain was organizing a large shipment.

That information was corroborated by intelligence also gathered by the U.S., Britain and Portugal, the statement said.

Since the beginning of 2017, Ecuador has confiscated about 30 tons of cocaine.

Large seizures of cocaine and cannabis aren’t uncommon in the Iberian Peninsula, which is seen as a drug gateway to Europe.

Spanish police captured almost eight metric tons of cocaine from four vessels in 2015 and 2016 and arrested 80 people, the police statement said.

 

Trump Orders Emergency Meeting After Global Cyber-attack

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Primer: Investigators launched a far-reaching hunt for the perpetrator, as institutions around the world worked to mitigate damage from the highest-profile computer-worm outbreak in nearly a decade. More here from the WSJ.

Image result for wannacry ransomware

President Trump reportedly ordered an emergency meeting over the weekend after an unprecedented cyberattack hit at least 100,000 organizations in 150 countries.

Senior security staffers with Homeland Security, the FBI and the National Security Agency met on Friday and Saturday in the White House to assess the threat from the “ransomware” attack, Reuters reported.

Trump ordered Homeland Security adviser Tom Bossert to hold the meeting, CBS News reported. Details of the meeting were not immediately disclosed.

The attack that began Friday is believed to be the biggest online extortion attack ever recorded, spreading chaos by locking computers that run Britain’s hospital network, Germany’s national railway and scores of other companies, factories and government agencies worldwide.

Steven Wilson, Head of Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre, told Sky News on Sunday that it was now important that IT departments checked their systems on Monday morning to ensure they had not been compromised.

Security experts warned that further cyberattacks are likely.

“The global reach is unprecedented and beyond what we have seen before,” Rob Wainwright, director of the Netherlands-based Europol said Sunday “The latest count is over 200,000 victims in at least 150 countries, and those victims, many of those will be businesses, including large corporations.”

“At the moment, we are in the face of an escalating threat. The numbers are going up,” he added. “I am worried about how the numbers will continue to grow when people go to work and turn on their machines on Monday morning.”

The Europol spokesman said it was too early to say who is behind the onslaught and what their motivation was. The main challenge for investigators was the fast-spreading capabilities of the malware, he said, adding that so far not many people have paid the ransoms that the virus demands.

Had it not been for a young cybersecurity researcher’s accidental discovery of a so-called “kill switch,” the malicious software likely would have spread much farther and faster. Security experts say this attack should wake up every corporate board room and legislative chamber around the globe.

***

The long-expected US Executive Order is out, and giving prominence to the NIST Framework, DHS,and OMB. Eternal Blue is used to spread WannaCry ransomware, and the UK’s NHS is hard hit. Fancy Bear prances in NATO costume. US Intelligence Community leaders warn the Senate that the Russian cyber threat is large, growing, and not going away. And spamming celebrates its thrity-ninth birthday—no happy returns for you, spammers.

In today’s podcast, we hear about the long-expected US Executive Order, with commentary from Politico’s Eric Geller. It was signed yesterday, and gives prominence to the NIST Framework, DHS,and OMB. Eternal Blue is used to spread WannaCry ransomware, and the UK’s NHS is hard hit. Fancy Bear prances in NATO costume. US Intelligence Community leaders warn the Senate that the Russian cyber threat is large, growing, and not going away. The University of Maryland’s Jonathan Katz explains some potential browser protocol vulnerabilities. And spamming celebrates its thirty-ninth birthday—no happy returns for you, spammers.  Go here for the podcast, see WannaCry ransomware title.  It is key to note that cyber experts saw chatter in hack chat rooms about this worm in April.

N. Korea Missile Hwasong 12 Launch with Video

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Korean Central Television

A test-fire of new ground-to-ground medium long-range strategic ballistic rocket Hwasong-12 was successfully carried out on Sunday by scientists and technicians in the field of rocket research, who are bravely advancing toward a new goal to be proud of in the world, true to the far-sighted idea of Kim Jong Un, chairman of the Workers’ Party of Korea, chairman of the State Affairs Commission of the DPRK and supreme commander of the Korean People’s Army, for building a nuclear power.
Kim Jong Un guided the test-fire on the spot.
Looking at Hwasong-12, he expressed his satisfaction over the possession of another “Juche weapon”, a perfect weapon system congruous with the military strategic and tactical idea of the WPK and the demand of the present times.
The test-fire was conducted at the highest angle in consideration of the security of neighboring countries. The test-fire aimed at verifying the tactical and technological specifications of the newly-developed ballistic rocket capable of carrying a large-size heavy nuclear warhead.
According to the order of Kim Jong Un, the new rocket Hwasong-12 was launched at 04:58 on Sunday.
The rocket accurately hit the targeted open waters 787km away after flying to the maximum altitude of 2 111.5km along its planned flight orbit.
The test-fire proved to the full all the technical specifications of the rocket, which was newly designed in a Korean-style by defence scientists and technicians, like guidance and stabilization systems, structural system and pressurization, inspection and launching systems and reconfirmed the reliability of new rocket engine under the practical flight circumstances.
It also verified the homing feature of the warhead under the worst re-entry situation and accurate performance of detonation system.
Kim Jong Un hugged officials in the field of rocket research, saying that they worked hard to achieve a great thing. And he had a picture taken with officials, scientists and technicians who took part in the test-fire.
Highly appreciating again their devotion for manufacturing the Korean-style medium long-range strategic ballistic rocket, he gave a special thanks to them on behalf of himself.
He said with confidence that the successful test-fire of Hwasong-12, a demonstration of high-level defence science and technology of the DPRK, is of great and special significance for securing peace and stability in the Korean peninsula and the region and is the greatest victory of the Korean people.
He declared that the DPRK is a nuclear power worthy of the name whether someone recognizes it or not. He stressed the DPRK will keep strict control over those engaging themselves in nuclear blackmail with its nuclear deterrence which has been unimaginably and rapidly developed.
The U.S. massively brought nuclear strategic assets to the vicinity of the Korean peninsula to threaten and blackmail the DPRK, but the coward American-style fanfaronade militarily browbeating only weak countries and nations which have no nukes can never work on the DPRK and is highly ridiculous, he said, stressing that if the U.S. dares opt for a military provocation against the DPRK, we are ready to counter it.
The most perfect weapon systems in the world will never become the eternal exclusive property of the U.S., he said, expressing the belief that the day when the DPRK uses the similar retaliatory means will come. He continued that on this occasion, the U.S. had better see clearly whether the ballistic rockets of the DPRK pose actual threat to it or not.
If the U.S. awkwardly attempts to provoke the DPRK, it will not escape from the biggest disaster in the history, he said, strongly warning the U.S. not to disregard or misjudge the reality that its mainland and Pacific operation region are in the DPRK’s sighting range for strike and that it has all powerful means for retaliatory strike.
He gave the scientists and technicians in the field of rocket research the order to continuously develop more precise and diversified nukes and nuclear striking means, not content with the successes, and make preparations for more tests till the U.S. and its vassal forces make a proper choice with reason.

*** 

ATN: North Korea launched a missile in a test early in the morning of May 14, North Korean time. If the information that has been reported about the test are correct, the missile has considerably longer range than its current missiles.

Reports from Japan say that the missile fell into the Sea of Japan after traveling about 700 km (430 miles), after flying for about 30 minutes.

A missile with a range of 1,000 km (620 miles), such as the extended-range Scud, or Scud-ER, would only have a flight time of about 12 minutes if flown on a slightly lofted trajectory that traveled 700 km.

A 30-minute flight time would instead require a missile that was highly lofted, reaching an apogee of about 2,000 km (1,240 miles) while splashing down at a range of 700 km. If that same missile was flown on a standard trajectory, it would have a maximum range of about 4,500 km (2,800 miles).

New press reports are in fact giving a 2,000 km apogee for the test.

This range is considerably longer than the estimated range of the Musudan missile, which showed a range of about 3,000 km in a test last year. Guam is 3,400 km from North Korea. Reaching the US West Coast would require a missile with a range of more than 8,000 km. Hawaii is roughly 7,000 km from North Korea.

This missile may have been the new mobile missile seen in North Korea’s April 15 parade (Fig. 2). It appears to be a two-stage liquid-fueled missile.

Fig. 2 (Source: KCNA)

Fig. 1  The black curve is the lofted trajectory flown on the test. The red curve is the same missile flown on a normal (MET) trajectory.

57,000 Detections, 74 Countries Affected by Global Ransomware

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Go here for more information on malware affections.

Further, US-CERT, by DHS has this information.

 

 

Older machines running XP do not appear to be affected. Meanwhile, about a month ago:

Microsoft responds to NSA’s Windows exploits, urges customers to upgrade to supported versions

Remember, this NSA vault toolkit was stolen, leaked and published by WikiLeaks, Julian Assange. In some cases, it could be a deadly threat to life considering the intrusions into hospitals. The other blame goes to the Russian cyber gang, ShadowBrokers.

Russian-linked cyber gang Shadow Brokers blamed for NHS computer hack 

Ransom message found on NHS computersCourtesy: TelegraphUK: Ransom message found on NHS computers

CyberScoop: Large organizations on every continent are being hit by a global campaign of ransomware attacks on Friday, unfortunately, average ransomware demand has increased significantly. Machines are being infected using exploits developed by the U.S. National Security Agency and leaked by the group known as ShadowBrokers, according to authorities.

More than 57,000 detections in 74 countries have been recorded. Russia appears to be the most infected country by far, according to cybersecurity firms Kaspersky and Avast.

The “number [is] still growing fast,” according to Costin Raiu, Kaspersky’s director of research.

Hospitals across England were forced to divert emergency patients, according to the National Health Service. Other hospitals are asking patients to avoid coming in except for emergencies, news reports said.

In Spain, victims including the telecommunications company Telefónica told employees to shut down machines and networks in an effort to stop the spread of the malware. Other victims include Gas Natural and Iberdrola, an electric utility firm.

The ransomware campaign is caused by “exploiting the vulnerability described in bulletin MS17-010 using EternalBlue / DoublePulsar,”Spain’s Computer Emergency Readiness Team explained on Friday. “Infection of a single computer can end up compromising the entire corporate network.”

EternalBlue and DoublePulsar are code names for NSA hacking tools used to infect thousands of machines around the world since the NSA tools leaked in April.

That description from Spanish authorities and the work of several researchers point directly to NSA tools hacked and leaked by ShadowBrokers. The patch that Microsoft published in March assigned the designation MS17-010 to the vulnerability.

A widespread “bloodbath” from criminals has been expected by experts since the leak.

The ransomware “infects the machine by encrypting all its files and, using a remote command execution vulnerability through SMB, is distributed to other Windows machines on the same network. Microsoft published the vulnerability on March 14 in its bulletin and a few days ago a proof of concept was released that seems to have been the trigger of the campaign.” SMB is Microsoft’s Server Message Block protocol for network file sharing.

The attacks in different countries have been linked to the same group, according to the Financial Times.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is “coordinating with our international cyber partners” in Europe and Asia, a spokesperson told CyberScoop. “The Department of Homeland Security stands ready to support any international or domestic partner’s request for assistance. We routinely provide cybersecurity assistance upon request, including technical analysis and support.  Information shared with DHS as part of these efforts, including whether a request has been made, is confidential.”

Security researcher Kevin Beaumont advised patching machines immediately:

** Kevin Beaumont?Verified account @GossiTheDog5h5 hours ago 

Confirmed – wcry ransomware spreading across Europe uses EternalBlue/MS17-010/SMB. PATCH NOW EVERYWHERE.

Spanish authorities confirmed the ransomware is a version of WannaCry (also known as WannaCrypt0r), according to the National Cryptology Center. In Spain, the newspaper El Mundo is reporting that “early indications point to an attack originating in China.”

“Given the rapid, prolific distribution of this ransomware, we consider this activity poses high risks that all organizations using potentially vulnerable Windows machines should address,” a spokesperson from the cybersecurity firm FireEye told CyberScoop. “Organizations seeking to take risk management steps related to this campaign can implement patching for the MS17-010 Microsoft Security bulletin and leverage the indicators of compromise identified as associated with this activity.”

FireEye has yet to see a U.S.-based company be affected by the ransomware worm.

An estimated 25 health facilities in London and across England have been hit, according to the NHS. St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London, one of the victims, received warnings earlier this year that computers using Windows XP were vulnerable, reported the technology news site the Inquirer. Increasingly, some infected hospitals are not accepting phone calls or internet communications. The Derbyshire Community Health Services NHS Trust has reportedly shut down all of its IT systems.

“At this stage we do not have any evidence that patient data has been accessed,” an NHS statement said. “We will continue to work with affected organizations to confirm this.”

East and North Hertfordshire NHS trust, a hospital just north of London, publicly acknowledged “a major IT problem” that is “believed to be caused by a cyber attack.”

“The trust is postponing all non-urgent activity for today and is asking people not to come to A&E – please ring NHS111 for urgent medical advice or 999 if it is a life-threatening emergency,” according to a statement. “To ensure that all back-up processes and procedures were put in place quickly, the trust declared a major internal incident to make sure that patients already in the trust’s hospitals continued to receive the care they need.”

News of the English hospitals being hit with ransomware spread quickly among doctors and hospital employees, including in a widely shared message from an English doctor now making the rounds on social media.

**

If.ra? @asystoly6h6 hours ago  Why would you cyber attack a hospital and hold it for ransom? The state of the world ?

“So our hospital is down,” the doctor wrote. “We got a message saying your computers are now under their control and pay a certain amount of money. And now everything is gone.”

DoJ, AG Sessions, Effectively Immediately

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Read the 2 page memo here.

Sessions ends Obama-era leniency on sentencing, infuriating civil rights groups

FNC: Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced Friday that he has told prosecutors to pursue the most serious charges possible against criminal suspects – a stunning reversal of Obama-era policies, and a move that infuriated civil rights groups.

“We will enforce the laws passed by Congress pure and simple,” he said at an awards ceremony in Washington D.C, adding that prosecutors deserved to be “unhandcuffed and not micro-managed from Washington.”

“This is a key part of President Trump’s promise to keep America safe,” Sessions said. “We’re seeing an increase in violent crime in our cities – in Baltimore, Chicago, Memphis, Milwaukee, St. Louis and many others.  The murder rate has surged 10 percent nationwide – the largest increase since 1968.”

In a letter to 94 U.S. attorneys Thursday night, Sessions called it a “core principle” that prosecutors charge and pursue “the most serious and readily provable offense.” Sessions defined the most serious offenses as those that carry the most substantial guidelines sentence.

Sessions noted that “there will be circumstances in which good judgment would lead a prosecutor to conclude that a strict application” of the policy is not warranted, but that any exceptions must first be approved by a U.S. attorney, assistant attorney general, or a designated supervisor.

The move, which will send more criminals to jail and for longer terms by triggering mandatory minimum sentences, explicitly reverses policies set in motion by President Obama’s former Attorney General Eric Holder – who implemented the “Smart on Crime” drug sentencing policy that focused on not incarcerating people who committed low level, non-violent crimes. DOJ officials call it a “false narrative” and say unless a gun is involved, most of those cases aren’t charged period.

Officials say Holder’s “Smart on Crime” policy “convoluted the process,” and left prosecutors applying the law unevenly, which they said “is not Justice.”

But civil rights groups blasted the process, with the American Civil Liberties Union describing the move as a move that will “reverse progress” and repeat the War on Drugs, which it called a “failed experiment.”

“With overall crime rates at historic lows, it is clear that this type of one-dimensional criminal justice system that directs prosecutors to give unnecessarily long and unfairly harsh sentences to people whose behavior does not call for it did not work,” Udi Ofer, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Campaign for Smart Justice.

The policy was also criticized by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who said mandatory minimums have “unfairly and disproportionately incarcerated too many minorities for too long.”

“Attorney General Sessions new policy will accentuate that injustice. Instead we should treat our nation’s drug epidemic as a health crisis and less as a lock ‘em up and throw away the key problem,” he said.

However, the National Association of Assistant United States Attorneys backed the move, saying it would make the public safer and give prosecutors to “tools that Congress intended” to lock up drug dealers and dismantle gangs.

 


Wait for it…nah never mind…former DOJ AG, Eric Holder has already responded.

Former Attorney General Eric Holder blasts Sessions memo as ‘dumb on crime’

Former Attorney General Eric Holder blasted a new Justice Department policy on prosecutions and sentencing, calling it “dumb on crime.”

“The policy announced today is not tough on crime. It is dumb on crime. It is an ideologically motivated, cookie-cutter approach that has only been proven to generate unfairly long sentences that are often applied indiscriminately and do little to achieve long-term public safety,” Holder said in a statement Friday shortly after the new department memo.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions released a memo early Friday directing prosecutors to “charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense” in all cases going forward.

The Sessions memo reverses one issued by Holder in 2013 that encouraged federal prosecutors to seek the most harsh punishment for only “serious, high-level, or violent drug traffickers” instead of lower-level offenders.

Holder cited department data showing that since the implementation of his memo — the Smart on Crime directive — prosecutors have been able to successfully focus more resources on higher level drug offenders such as kingpins and cartel leaders.

“The data showed that while they brought fewer indictments carrying a mandatory minimum sentence, the prosecutions of high-level drug defendants had risen and that cooperation and plea rates remained effectively the same,” Holder said. “These reversals will be both substantively and financially ruinous, setting the Department back on track to again spending one-third of its budget on incarcerating people, rather than preventing, detecting, or investigating crime.”