The hackers who recently targeted the network of the candidate Emmanuel Macron at the Élysée, have targeted NATO personnel in Belgium, Belgian diplomats abroad as well as Skynet.be customers in attacks carried out between 2014 and 2016, La Libre Belgique reported on Friday. The information comes from the report of a researcher from the cyber security firm Trend Micro, dealing with the "hacker" group Pawn Storm (sometimes called "Strontium", "Fancy Bear", "Sednit" or "APT28").
The hackers tried to hack the private mailboxes of NATO officials in Belgium via a "phishing" technique. Another attack, dating back to December 2015, targeted high-level customers of the Skynet.be messenger, Proximus, according to the researcher. The company confirmed this cyber attack to La Libre Belgique. Finally, Belgian embassies were also targeted by the group, to which is attributed the attack that paralysed TV5 Monde in 2015.
This group of hackers is linked, according to the American intelligence agencies, to the Kremlin. It is the same group who is accused of having influenced the last American presidential election by conducting cyber attacks against the Democratic party during the campaign of Hillary Clinton.
The Brussels Times
