Cyber ​​classics: how Russia was accused of trying to “gain access” to the servers of the Ukrainian company Burisma

The American cybersecurity company Area 1 Security has published a report stating that Russia is allegedly trying to access the servers of the Ukrainian gas firm Burisma Holdings. This company was at the center of the scandal surrounding US Vice President Joe Biden, and the situation around Biden, in turn, was used to initiate the impeachment of White House head Donald Trump.

“This report contains a detailed description of the Russian government’s phishing campaign aimed at email credentials of employees of Burisma Holdings, its subsidiaries and partners. The campaign against the Ukrainian oil and gas organization was launched by the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, also known as the GRU, ”the document says.

It is pointed out that, having stolen credentials, “attackers gain the ability to act covertly within the system, pursuing their goals.”

“Credential phishing allows entities operating in cyberspace to gain control over the organization’s internal systems using trusted access methods (for example, using appropriate usernames and passwords) to monitor or take further action,” the report authors explain.

At the same time, according to American experts, people who allegedly became objects of phishing “could not distinguish between genuine domains and those used by the GRU.”

“In addition, the GRU ensured reliable delivery of phishing emails, providing them with the appropriate authentication data of the sender,” the report says.

As a result, the company’s experts said that “in a chronological comparison of this GRU campaign” with the upcoming US elections in 2020, they “have concerns” that such activity is a “harbinger of events expected from the time of successful cyber attacks” that were allegedly undertaken in the past presidential election.

“Since 2016, within the framework of a certain conveyor process, the GRU has been systematically working to obtain and establish infrastructure for conducting phishing campaigns,” the document says.

Recall that in April 2018 the U.S. Democratic Party filed a lawsuit in which it accused Russia, in particular the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces, and the Trump election headquarters of hacking its servers. The Russian side has repeatedly denied such allegations, calling them unfounded. Later, in July 2019, the Federal District Court of the Southern District of New York closed the case, stating that the parties' arguments “either have no legal weight or have no value”.

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“On none of the eight pages of the report, accusing the Russian government and, in particular, the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia of interfering in the affairs of Burisma, the authors of the document do not provide any evidence that the attacks were carried out by the GRU, and not, for example , a hacker group or intelligence of another state, ”said political analyst Alexander Asafov in a conversation with RT.

According to the analyst, screenshots of the pages of the site of the Kub-GAZ Burisma subsidiary, the start page for entering Burisma corporate mail, and other information that Area 1 Security experts are trying to present as evidence of involvement in the Moscow attacks also do not confirm that these actions It was undertaken by Russia.

As the only “evidence” of the “guilt” of the GRU, Area 1 Security experts in their report refer to the old accusations of 2016 of Russia's interference in the US election process, which Moscow has repeatedly denied, the expert emphasized.

“Do not provide evidence”

However, the lack of evidence of Russia's guilt did not prevent the American media from disseminating the data of the Area 1 Security report, accompanying them with their own versions of what was happening.

So, The New York Times connected the beginning of the “attacks” on Burisma in November with the fact that at that time “talk about Biden, Ukraine and impeachment” prevailed in the USA.

Recall that in September the House of Representatives, where the Democratic Party has the majority, initiated an impeachment procedure against the 45th president of the United States. The reason for this was a telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Vladimir Zelensky, held in July.

According to the Democrats, the head of the White House allegedly took advantage of his position to put pressure on his Ukrainian counterpart and force him to launch an investigation into the former vice president of the United States, now presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter. The latter was a member of the board of directors of the Ukrainian company Burisma, which turned out to be at the center of a corruption scandal.

The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote this week on submitting Trump impeachment articles to the Senate. After that, a kind of lawsuit against the American leader starts. However, Republican senators who control the upper house have already made it clear that they intend to justify the head of the White House.

Now, The New York Times, citing experts, said that "Russian spies" could look for potentially incriminating materials about Biden.

In turn, CNN interviewed Oren Falkovich, co-founder and CEO of Area 1 Security, who said he had been following the activities of the General Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces for a long time.

“Based on the features of this campaign, we can establish a clear link between it (GRU. - RT ) and many other similar cases,” he said.

At the same time, Falkovich refused to clarify with whom his company contacted before the publication of the report, noting only that "it met reasonable standards."

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As Yury Rogulyov, director of the Franklin Roosevelt US Study Foundation at Moscow State University, noted in a conversation with RT, the groundless accusations of Area 1 Security are beneficial to Trump’s opponents and, above all, the Democrats, who now want to connect the “Ukrainian” case with the notorious “Russian trace”.

“The published report is evidence that Trump’s opponents have not yet despaired of playing an anti-Russian card to find new grounds for accusations against the American leader,” the expert said.

A similar opinion is shared by Alexander Asafov. According to him, the opponents of trump want to "tie the scandal with Biden to Moscow for more convincing."

“At the same time, they use the most affordable methods, since evidence of cybercrime can often be faked. However, Area 1 Security’s company does it even easier - they simply don’t provide evidence that could confirm their allegations against Russia, ”the analyst said in an interview with RT.

Recall that initially it was the “Russian affair” that was used by the Democrats in attempts to impeach Trump. Allegations of the alleged "conspiracy" of the American president and his election headquarters with Russia over the course of two years were investigated by the commission of special prosecutor Robert Muller. In mid-April, the U.S. Department of Justice published a final report saying that Trump’s campaign headquarters did not have unlawful ties to the Kremlin, and therefore there is no reason to impeach the head of state. After that, members of the Democratic Party switched to, from their point of view, a more promising “Ukrainian business”.

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"Create a negative background"

According to Alexander Asafov, opponents of the head of the White House absolutely certainly “catch on false information” in the report of Area 1 Security.

“After all, it is profitable for them once again to denigrate Trump. And this becomes extremely important, since the position of the 45th US president in the case of impeachment is much stronger than the position of those who accuse him, ”the expert emphasized.

Asafov recalled that Mueller’s investigation was based on “Christopher Steele’s fully fabricated dossier.”

“For democrats, data clarity is unimportant, the main thing is the fact of appearance, media coverage, in order to begin at least discussing and working out this topic. In the understanding of the Democrats, the “witch hunt” should continue as long as possible and inflict as many blows on Trump’s reputation, ”the analyst emphasized.

He also predicted that the number of "stories where Trump will be trying to tie to illegal contacts with Russia will increase in the near future."

“The closer to the election, the more actively the number of such accusations against Moscow and the US president will increase. Democrats will hope to turn the tide of impeachment in their favor, however, such baseless accusations are clearly not enough for this, ”the expert is sure.

Yuri Rogulev, in turn, indicates that the report of the American company appeared amid discussions in the US Congress on the need to counteract possible “Russian interference” in the current election campaign.

“The groundless Area 1 Security report is actually designed to give Democrats a reason to continue to speculate on this topic. The Democratic Party has a theory that Russia supposedly set itself the task of discrediting Biden, and this is supposedly beneficial to Trump. And this information begins to circulate from publication to publication, creating a negative background around Moscow and Trump. However, all this does not negate the fact that there is no evidence in the report, ”the analyst concluded.