In August, a group of hackers known as the “Shadow Brokers” claimed to have infiltrated NSA and stolen over $500 million worth of “cyberweapons.”
They released a few files to prove it and the codes seemed genuine. “A tracking code found in code released by the group used a tracking code found in previously unreleased Edward Snowden files,” reports The Hill.
Now, Shadow Brokers is selling the NSA’s package of Windows hacking tools.
The group initially tried to auction the secret files for millions of dollars, but who wants to bid on something when they don’t know what it is? On top of that, many believed the Brokers would keep the money and refuse to deliver the files to the winner – or simply release the cyberweapons for free if they received enough money.
But they didn’t receive enough money, and now Shadow Brokers is running a sale on NSA tools, selling them piece by piece at Bitcoin prices.
You can purchase the whole payload for BTC 1000 – which is just under $800,000.
This new sale coincides with increased animosity towards WikiLeaks, a group also claiming to have access to the NSA tools.
“@wikileaks [re]member when you claimed you had stuff from #shadowbrokers, what happened to that?” the semi-literate group tweeted on Saturday.
The hackers have also accused WikiLeaks of hoarding personal information about Twitter users. “LOL thinking same, this is nature of human animal, today’s dissident is tomorrow’s dictator, #trustnoone #nomoresecrets #f***theworld!” the group tweeted.
The bottom line here is that the NSA lost sensitive information and that information is now on sale to any nefarious party that wants to use it.
Editor’s note: Interesting that the CIA used the “footprint” of alleged Russian cybertools to prove Russia’s involvement. But how many times have those tools been stolen and how many other parties use these same tools? One would think NSA is more security than the Russian intel services. Bottom line, if a system is open to one hacker, it is open to dozens, maybe hundreds of others. That’s how it works folks.