Iranian cyberattacks targeted accounts linked to Trump, Biden, Google confirms

An Iranian phishing scheme has targeted a dozen email accounts linked to US officials and campaign staff for President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, according to a threat analysis report released by Google Wednesday

Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) identified several cyber attacks from a group linked to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. seconds in the threat report. TAG has foiled multiple attempts, but the hacking group, known as APT42, successfully infiltrated an account belonging to a “high-profile political adviser” and has also been targeted. Israeli civil servants

“Today, TAG continues to observe unsuccessful attempts by ATP42 to compromise the personal accounts of individuals affiliated with President Biden, Vice President Harris, and former President Trump, including current and former government officials and individuals associated with the campaigns” , the report states.

APT42 sent benign social engineering emails masquerading as journalists and official organizations in an attempt to gain the recipient's trust, as well as various phishing campaigns that contained links intended to collect sensitive information without the user's knowledge , Google reported. US and Israeli government officials, campaign staff, diplomats, think tanks and non-governmental organizations have been constant targets of the group.

The tech giant said it was experiencing “increased malicious activity from foreign state actors” and that the Iranian group “shows[s] there is no sign of stopping their attempts to target users and deploy new tactics.”

“This spring and summer, they have demonstrated the ability to run numerous simultaneous phishing campaigns, particularly targeting Israel and the US,” Google said in the report. “As hostilities between Iran and Israel intensify, we can expect increased campaigns from there [the hackers].”

On August 9, Microsoft released its own threat intelligence report, which revealed similar findings to Google's, reporting an “emergence of significant influence activities by Iranian actors” in cyberspace, particularly attacks aimed at impact US elections. Microsoft reported infiltration of an account belonging to a former presidential candidate, as well as several websites targeting voters to increase political tension in the US

According to the report, affected parties have been notified of the threat and Google is working to continuously monitor and address the threats.

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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