Hacker Who Knocked Million Routers Offline Using MIRAI Arrested at London Airport

British police have arrested a suspect in connection with the massive attack on Deutsche Telekom that hit nearly 1 Million routers last November.
Late last year, someone knocked down more than 900,000 broadband routers belonging to Deutsche Telekom users in Germany, which affected the telephony, television, and internet service in the country.
Now, Germany's federal criminal police force (BKA) revealed today that the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) reportedly arrested a 29-year-old British suspect at Luton airport in London on Wednesday, who is accused of being the mastermind behind the last year's attack.

 In a statement, the German police said the last year's attack was especially severe and was carried out to compromise the home routers to enroll them in a network of hijacked machines popularly known as Botnet, and then offer the DDoS services for sale on dark web markets.
But ultimately, the attack created a denial-of-service situation, which resulted in more than 900,000 customers losing Internet connectivity for a while.
"From the outset, Deutsche Telekom cooperated with law enforcement agencies," BKA said. "Technical assistance was also provided by the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) in the analysis of the malicious software used."
The Botnet of hacked machines is used to carry out "distributed denial of service" (DDoS) attacks to knock any site or server offline by sending them a larger number of rogue requests than they can handle.
It is believed that a modified version of the infamous Mirai malware – a piece of nasty IoT malware which scans for insecure routers, cameras, DVRs, and other IoT devices and enslaves them into a botnet network – was used to create service disruption.

 Mirai is the same botnet that knocked the entire Internet offline last year, crippling some of the world's biggest and most popular websites.
The BKA got involved in the investigation as the attack on Deutsche Telekom was deemed to be a threat to the country's national communication infrastructure.
German police from the city of Cologne identified the suspect and issued the international arrest warrant.
The BKA said the cops would extradite the 29-year-old man to Germany to face charges of computer sabotage. If convicted, he can get a prison sentence of up to 10 years.
The department said it would release further information by the ongoing investigations.

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Watch Out! First-Ever Word Macro Malware for Apple Mac OS Discovered in the Wild

After targeting Windows-based computers over the past few years, hackers are now shifting their interest to Macs as well.
The emergence of the first macro-based Word document attack against Apple's macOS platform is the latest example to prove this.
The concept of Macros dates back to 1990s. You might be familiar with the message that reads: "Warning: This document contains macros."
Macro is a series of commands and actions that help automate some tasks. Microsoft Office programs support Macros written in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), but they can also be used for malicious activities like installing malware.
Until now, hackers were cleverly using this technique to target Windows.
However, security researchers have now detected the first in-the-wild instance of hackers are making use of malicious macros in Word documents to install malware on Mac computers and steal your data – an old Windows technique.
The hack tricks victims into opening infected Word documents that subsequently run malicious macros. One such malicious Word file discovered by the researcher was titled "U.S. Allies and Rivals Digest Trump's Victory – Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.docm."
However, after clicking on the malicious Word document and before running it on your system, Mac users are always prompted to enable macros.
Denying permission can save you, but if enabled ignoring warnings, the embedded macro executes a function, coded in Python, that downloads the malware payload to infect the Mac PCs, allowing hackers to monitor webcams, access browser history logs, and steal password and encryption keys.
According to a blog post published this week by Patrick Wardle, director of research at security firm Synack, the Python function is virtually identical to EmPyre – an open source Mac and Linux post-exploitation agent.
"It’s kind of a low-tech solution, but on one hand it’s abusing legitimate functionality so it’s not going to crash like a memory corruption or overflow might, and it’s not going to be patched out," said Wardle.
Wardle tracked the IP address from which the malicious Word documents were spread to Russia and that IP has previously been associated with malicious activities like phishing attacks.
Another malicious attack discovered by researchers this week also relied on standard Windows techniques by prompting users to download and install a fake software update, but actually harvest the user Keychain, phish usernames and passwords, and other sensitive data.
The MacDownloader nasty virus presented itself as both an update for Adobe Flash and the Bitdefender Adware Removal Tool, which are always annoying and dismissed by most users.
This is what all attackers want. Once the user clicks on either reject the updates or just press yes to dismiss it once and for all, the malware gets the green signal to harvest user keychain, phish usernames and passwords, collect private and sensitive data, and then send them back to attackers.
Researchers have spotted macOS malware targeting mostly the defense industry and reported to have been used against a human rights advocate.
The best way to avoid these kinds of attacks is to just deny permission to enable macros from running when opening a suspicious Word document and avoid downloading software from third-party App Store or un-trusted websites.

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North Korea test-fires missile, Abe condemns

PYONGYANG: North Korea appeared to fire a ballistic missile early Sunday in what would be its first such test of the year and an implicit challenge to US President Donald Trump, who stood with the Japanese leader as Shinzo Abe called the move 'intolerable.'
There was no immediate confirmation from the North, which had recently warned it was ready to test its first intercontinental ballistic missile. The US Strategic Command said it detected and tracked what it assessed to be a medium- or intermediate-range ballistic missile.
North Korean media are often slow to announce such launches, if they announce them at all. As of Sunday afternoon, there had been no official announcement and most North Koreans went about their day with no inkling that the launch was major international news.
The reports of the launch came as Trump was hosting Prime Minister Abe and just days before the North is to mark the birthday of leader Kim Jong Un's late father, Kim Jong Il.
Appearing with Trump at a news conference at the president's south Florida estate, Abe condemned the missile launch as 'absolutely intolerable.'
Abe read a brief statement in which he called on the North to comply fully with relevant U.N. Security Council resolutions. He said Trump had assured him of US support and that Trump's presence showed the president's determination and commitment.
Trump followed Abe with even fewer words, saying in part: "I just want everybody to understand and fully know that the United States of America stands behind Japan, its great ally, 100 percent."
South Korea's joint chiefs of staff said in a statement that the missile was fired from around Banghyon, North Pyongan Province, which is where South Korean officials have said the North test-launched its powerful mid-range Musudan missile on Oct. 15 and 20.
The military in Seoul said that the missile flew about 500 kilometers. But South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported that while determinations were still being made, it was not believed to be an intercontinental ballistic missile.
The missile splashed down into the sea between the Korean Peninsula and Japan, according to the US Strategic Command. Japanese chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters that the missile did not hit Japanese territorial seas.
The North conducted two nuclear tests and a slew of rocket launches last year in continued efforts to expand its nuclear weapons and missile programs. Kim Jong Un said in his New Year's address that the country had reached the final stages of readiness to test an ICBM, which would be a major step forward in its efforts to build a credible nuclear threat to the United States.
Though Pyongyang has been relatively quiet about the transfer of power to the Trump administration, its state media has repeatedly called for Washington to abandon its 'hostile policy' and vowed to continue its nuclear and missile development programs until the US changes its diplomatic approach.
Just days ago, it also reaffirmed its plan to conduct more space launches, which it staunchly defends but which have been criticized because they involve dual-use technology that can be transferred to improve missiles.
Kim Dong-yeop, an analyst at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies in Seoul, speculated that the missile could be a Musudan or a similar rocket designed to test engines for an intercontinental ballistic missile that could hit the US mainland. Analysts are divided, however, over how close the North is to having a reliable long-range rocket that could be coupled with a nuclear warhead capable of striking US targets.
South Korean Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, who is also the acting president, said his country would punish North Korea for the missile launch. According to the Foreign Ministry, South Korea will continue to work with allies, including the United States, Japan and the European Union, to ensure a thorough implementation of sanctions against the North and make the country realize that it will 'never be able to survive' without discarding all of its nuclear and missile programs.

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Paris: Man shot, wounded after attacking soldiers outside Louvre museum

A police union official said the attacker was carrying two backpacks and had two machetes.
A knife-wielding man shouting “Allahu akbar” attacked French soldiers on patrol near the Louvre Museum Friday in what officials described as a suspected terror attack. The soldiers first tried to fight off the attacker and then opened fire, shooting him five times. The attack at an entrance to a shopping mall that extends beneath the museum sowed panic and again highlighted the threat French officials say hangs over the country, which was hit repeatedly by extremist attacks in 2015 and 2016.
A police union official said the attacker was carrying two backpacks and had two machetes. He said the man launched himself at the soldiers when they told him that he could not bring his bags into the Carrousel du Louvre shopping mall underneath the world-famous museum where the “Mona Lisa” hangs.
“That’s when he got the knife out and that’s when he tried to stab the soldier,” said the official, Yves Lefebvre. The four soldiers first tried to fight off the attacker before opening fire, said Benoit Brulon, a spokesman for the military force that patrols Paris and its major tourist attractions. The French interior ministry said anti-terrorism prosecutors are investigating. There were no immediate details about the identity of the attacker. “Allahu akbar” is the Arabic phrase for “God is great.”
The patrols – numbering about 3,500 soldiers in the Paris area – were instituted following the January 2015 attacks on Paris’ satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and reinforced after Nov. 13 suicide bomb and gun attacks that left 130 people dead at the city’s Bataclan concert hall and other sites. The attacker slightly injured one of the soldiers, in the scalp, officials said. Another soldier opened fire, gravely wounding the attacker.
“He is wounded in the stomach,” said police chief Michel Cadot. “He is conscious and he was moving.”
Checks of the man’s two backpacks found they didn’t contain any explosives, he said. Cadot said a second person who was “acting suspiciously” also was arrested but appears not to have been linked to the attack. Restaurant worker Sanae Hadraoui, 32, was waiting for breakfast at the Louvre’s restaurant complex when she heard the first gunshot, followed by another and then a couple more.
“I hear a shot. Then a second shot. Then maybe two more. I hear people screaming, “Evacuate! Evacuate!” “They told us to evacuate. I told my colleagues at the McDonalds. We went downstairs and then took the emergency exit.” Hadraoui, who has worked at the Louvre for seven years, said the evacuation was orderly. She was smoking a cigarette when her managers told her people were going back inside.
The museum in the center of Paris is one of the French capital’s biggest tourist attractions. Police sealed off entrances around where the attack took place and closed the area to vehicles, snarling traffic in a busy part of central Paris. Officers shooed away confused tourists. Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said about 1,000 people were inside the actual museum and were held inside in safe areas before the all-clear was given and they were allowed to move around as normal again.
Exterminator Olivier Majewski says he was just leaving his scooter in the parking lot beneath the Louvre when he saw a crush of people running and screaming “there’s been a terror attack.” The 53-year-old says he hid for about 15 minutes before gingerly making his way upstairs.
“They were panicked,” he said.

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Donald Trump says conversation with Malcolm Turnbull was 'very civil

US President Donald Trump says his conversation with Malcolm Turnbull was "very civil", after news of an adversarial phone call between the allies hit headlines around the world.

On Thursday, the Washington Post broke news of the tense call, with White House sources saying Mr Trump labelled a refugee deal between the US and Australia "the worst deal ever".
He also complained the call was "the worst by far" of any world leader that day, before abruptly ending the conversation 25 minutes into the scheduled hour, sources said.

This account was confirmed to Fairfax Media by an Australian cabinet minister, who described the report as being "broadly accurate".
Speaking on radio on Thursday, Mr Turnbull would only deny he had been hung up on. He said the call, which he described as "frank" and "forthright", ended courteously.

Late on Friday evening, Donald Trump responded to thank him for his comments.
"Thank you to Prime Minister of Australia for telling the truth about our very civil conversation," Mr Trump said.
Mr Trump accused "fake news media" of lying about the phone call.

However, Mr Turnbull did not publicly denounce the report, and government sources told journalists in Australia it was true.

Further government sources briefed numerous journalists on Thursday to say Malcolm Turnbull held his own in the phone call, which they characterized as being bullying.

At a prayer breakfast on Thursday, Trump also appeared to acknowledge he had been having "tough" phone calls.

"When you hear about the tough phone calls I'm having, don't worry about it," Mr Trump said. "Just don't worry about it. They're tough. We have to be tough.

"It's time we're going to be a little tough folks. We're taken advantage of by every nation in the world virtually. It's not going to happen anymore. It's not going to happen anymore."

Later, as diplomats in the US and Australia scrambled, Mr Trump held a meeting at the White House where he sent more mixed messages, implying Australia had taken advantage of the United States.

"A lot of people taking advantage of us, a lot of countries taking advantage of us, really terribly taking advantage of us," he said.

"We had one instance in Australia - I have a lot of respect for Australia, I love Australia as a country - but we had a problem where, for whatever reason, President Obama said that they were going to take probably well over a thousand illegal immigrants who were in prisons," he said.

"They were going to bring them and take them into this country. And I just said why?

"Why are we doing this? What's the purpose? So we'll see what happens. But a previous administration does something, you have to respect that."

Mr Turnbull has maintained the refugee deal - which will see 1250 refugees from Manus Island and Nauru taken to the US - will go ahead.

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François Hollande leads attacks on Donald Trump at EU summit

François Holland has led a series of damning attacks on Donald Trump by EU leaders arriving at a summit in Malta to discuss the future of the union.

The French president described recent comments by the US president as unacceptable and warned there would be no future for Europe’s relations with the US “if this future isn’t defined in common”.

The Austrian chancellor, Christian Kern, said Trump’s ban on travelers from some Muslim-majority countries was “highly problematic”.

Dalia Grybauskaitė, the Lithuanian president, offered a withering verdict on the recent meeting between Trump and Theresa May. “I don’t think there is a necessity for a bridge. We communicate with the Americans on Twitter,” she said.
The British prime minister, with the UK’s recently appointed permanent representative to the EU, Sir Tim Barrow, by her side, was one of the few leaders not to comment as she entered through the door of the Grand Masters Palace, where the 28 member states are holding talks.

Holland was scornful of Trump’s first days in the Oval office, and warned him to stay out of the EU’s internal affairs. “It cannot be accepted that there is, through a certain number of statements by the president of the United States, pressure on what Europe ought to be or what it should not be,” he said.

On Thursday the Guardian revealed that leaders of the parties in the European parliament were seeking to block the expected appointment of Ted Malloch as the US ambassador to the EU following his claim that he intended to “tame” the union.

Asked what he thought of EU leaders, like those of Hungary and Poland, who were leaning towards Trump, Holland said: “Those who want to forge bilateral ties with the US are of course well understood by the public.

“But they must understand that there is no future with Trump if it is not a common position. What matters is solidarity at the EU level. We must not imagine some sort of external protection. It exists through the Atlantic alliance, but it cannot be the only possible route, because who knows what the US president really wants, particularly in relation to the Atlantic alliance and burden-sharing?

“We in France have a defense policy. We fear nothing … We must have a European conception of our future. If not, there will be – in my opinion – no Europe and not necessarily any way for each of the countries to be able to exert an influence in the world.”

The European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, said he did not feel “threatened” by Trump, but voiced his concern that the US administration was not on top of world affairs. “There is room for explanations because of the impression that the new administration does not know the EU in detail, but in the European Union details matter,” he said.
Austria’s leader, Kern, said of Trump’s decision to ban nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries: “We should win these countries as allies in the fight against [radical] Islamism, not as adversaries, and we shouldn’t corner them.”

He went on to highlight what he described as America’s “responsibility for the refugee flows through the way it intervened militarily”.

Kern said: “It’s not acceptable for the international community if America shirks responsibility. We need to make this clear to our American friends. I’m convinced that there will be a high degree of unanimity [among EU leaders] on this question … The tangible aspects of Trump’s politics are raising some concern.” He added that Trump could be a catalyst for a stronger Europe.

Xavier Bettel, Luxembourg’s PM, said it was too soon to draw conclusions on Trump but his were “not the values I’m fighting for in politics”.

The European commission’s high representative, Federica Mogherini, said the EU did not “believe in walls and in bans”, and claimed the union would be a reference point for the world. She said: “We are and we will remain friends with the American people and the American administration on the basis of our own strong values, principles and interests.”

The European commissioner Günther Oettinger warned the EU not to allow Trump to divide them. “First of all, we must be careful not to accept his game,” Oettinger, a German, told Deutschlandfunk radio.

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