Risk Based Security
riskbasedsecurity.com · Company blog · on HN since 2013
Risk Based Security publishes analysis of data breaches and hacks, including the Sony hack, Equation Group leaks and political data dumps.
What HN saysHN commenters treat its Sony hack breakdown as a canonical source and cite it for background on the Shadow Brokers leak.
16HN people shared it
4linked it in comments
22stories submitted
532story points
9 years agolast shared
2013people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1A Breakdown and Analysis of the December, 2014 Sony Hack5 people · 10 points · first shared 2014 · discussion on HN
- 2Lifting the Shadows of the NSA’s Equation Group3 people · 146 points · first shared 2016 · 55 comments on HN
- 3MEGA BREACH: 58M Accounts Leaked from Modern Business Solutions2 people · 4 points · first shared 2016 · 1 comments on HN
- 4RIP Cert.org1 people · 194 points · first shared 2018 · 29 comments on HN
- 5Soros, the Open Society Foundations, and the Continued Political Hacks1 people · 101 points · first shared 2016 · 77 comments on HN
- 6Website of Albanian Hitmen-For-Hire Hacked, Data Dumped Online1 people · 53 points · first shared 2016 · 17 comments on HN
- 7DC Leaks: Little Known Site Dumps Data on George Soros1 people · 5 points · first shared 2016 · 1 comments on HN
- 8So You Wanted to Be a Black Hat? You Might Just Get Blacklisted1 people · 4 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
- 9A Breakdown and Analysis of the Sony Hack (December 17 Update)1 people · 3 points · first shared 2014 · discussion on HN
- 10Help Us Tell Telly That They Have Exposed 8M Subscribers1 people · 3 points · first shared 2016 · 2 comments on HN
- 11WADA Data on Three USA Athletes Leaked – Russia Blamed Immediately1 people · 2 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
- 12Data Breaches Lead to Over 1B Records Exposed in the First Half of 20161 people · 2 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
- 13Equifax Breach: Ambulance Chasing, FireEye, and a News Roundup1 people · 1 points · first shared 2017 · discussion on HN
- 14Thomson Reuters World-Check Terrorist Database, Open for the World to View1 people · 1 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
- 15Kapustkiy: The 17 Year Old Man, the Myth, the Motivations1 people · 1 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
DonHopkins · 2016-08-17
I googled that phrase and also "HTTPSExploit", and came up with a few articles that mentioned it:
[1] http://rebrn.com/re/the-nsa-has-been-hacked-and-the-hackers-are-releas…
[2] https://www.riskbasedsecurity.com/2016/08/the-shadow-brokers-lifting-t…
[3] http://pastebin.com/Uu4qsbUN
mikehotel · 2014-12-22
In a data breach this large, the confidential data itself can be a source of new information.
https://www.riskbasedsecurity.com/2014/12/a-breakdown-and-analysis-of-… has a decent overview of what you may have missed if you are only paying attention to FBI or SPE press releases.
KaiserPro · 2014-12-18
https://www.riskbasedsecurity.com/2014/12/a-breakdown-and-analysis-of-… < for me is the canonical source of news.
yourad_io · 2014-12-22
The leaks started on November 24.
> On December 1st, NBC News aired a segment reporting that the FBI were investigating the breach and the possibility that North Korea was involved. While this may sound far-fetched at first, North Korea has a clear motive in attacking Sony.
That was the first NK link.
> (December 8) Unlike previous disclosures that were straight-forward, this group of files comes shortly after the appearance of a Pastebin link (now 404) that purports to be from the GOP, and gives a reason for the attacks on Sony Pictures, linking it to the now controversial movie, “The Interview”. There is speculation that the new announcement may not be authentic as it did not get sent out via the previous channels, and suggests an almost afterthought of blaming the movie for their actions.
That was the first time the GoP (if that was them in the first place) mentioning any of this.
Two likely possibilities (imho):
* Someone else did it purporting to be them, and the GoP didn't deny it for the extra lolz (+ it didn't hurt their cause/objectives)
* They did it themselves to reinforce the media frenzy (by that time, the NK link was almost presented as a fact in many media sources)
Think about it this way: If this is an independent group of hackers, completely unrelated with any states (through funding or otherwise), through the NK link they "leveled up": Convincing the World that this was NK, we're in cyberwar, the world is ending (etc) far outweighs "hacked Sony for…