When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

Already a subscriber? Log in .

You've reached your limit of one free article.

Get unlimited access to Worldcrunch

You can cancel anytime .

SUBSCRIBERS BENEFITS

Exclusive International news coverage

Ad-free experience NEW

Weekly digital Magazine NEW

9 daily & weekly Newsletters

Access to Worldcrunch archives

Free trial

30-days free access, then $2.90
per month.

Annual Access BEST VALUE

$19.90 per year, save $14.90 compared to monthly billing.save $14.90.

Subscribe to Worldcrunch
Israel

Israeli Defense Computers Compromised By Gaza Hackers

Israeli Defense Computers Compromised By Gaza Hackers
Sagi Cohen

TEL AVIV — Just last week at the Davos summit, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was publicly praising the hi-tech industry in Israel. Now it seems his compliments may have been a bit premature.

A new report says that Palestinian hackers from Gaza have recently launched a cyber-attack on Israel that has successfully targeted government agencies, according to the Israeli information security company Seculert.

A number of publicly-run and funded organizations have been infected with a computer virus that allowed the hackers to access the devices from a distance.

One of the attacked organisations was the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria, a branch of the Defense Ministry. “The attack was particularly worrying because this administration is responsible for issuing permits to enter Israel,” explains a company official.

The damage that was caused was significant: Over the past several weeks, the hackers had complete control of the computers belonging to these public institutions. Officials believe that those responsible for the attack were a group of hackers from Gaza — the same group that attacked the Israeli police in October 2012 with a Trojan horse malware. That attack forced the Police to temporarily disconnect all their computers from the Internet.

This time, the hackers sent a bogus email to different Israeli organizations that appeared to be from the Shin Bet — the Israeli internal security service — purporting to contain information about an impending terror attack. The moment the files were opened, an invisible application was launched that allowed the hackers to control the computers.

A spokesman for the Israeli Defense Forces said in response: “The issue is being checked.”

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

Future

Beyond Musk: Is There A Right-Wing Shift Of Tech Spreading Worldwide?

The culture of Silicon Valley was once associated with social liberalism and tolerance. However, the tech community worldwide, from moguls such as Elon Musk or Peter Thiel, to IT professionals in Poland, and self-described OSINT users in India, is showing signs of a noted right-wing shift.

Photo of a person typing on a laptop with lines of code on the screen

Is the rightward direction of tech accelerating?

Katarzyna Skiba*

PARIS — For decades, the tech world acquired a reputation for open-mindedness and politically progressive values. Indeed, the origins of Silicon Valley are intimately linked to the 1960s counter-culture scene just a few miles up the road in San Francisco.

With its central role in today's economy, and arrival in mainstream culture, those would-be hippie days were bound to fade. Yet there has been a notable shift to more conservative — and even far-right — voices from the tech community that first began during the presidency of Donald Trump. Now the rightward direction of tech appears to be accelerating, with the emergence over the past year of Elon Musk as a hero of the populist far-right as only the most visible example.

But it's not just an American thing: a look around the world finds that the growing connections between tech and the far right goes well beyond the U.S., with examples showing up from Poland to India to Argentina.

Keep reading...Show less

The latest