According to US officials, the hackers launched “harvesting campaigns” against targets of “intelligence interest” to the Russian government by using default passwords to obtain access to internet routers.
The hackers, who are allegedly from Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate’s (GRU) covert hacking unit, are said to have accessed over 1,000 home and small business internet routers in the US and other countries.
The US Justice Department claims that the hackers then launched “harvesting campaigns” against targets of “intelligence interest” to the Russian government using the compromised devices.
But according to the department, US officials—including FBI teams—were able to surreptitiously “neutralize” the network by remotely altering the compromised routers, which put an end to the campaign.
According to US Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, the agency has stopped state-sponsored hackers from conducting assaults using hacked routers for the second time in two months.
“To help them target home and office routers, Russian intelligence services in this case turned to criminal groups,” US Attorney General Merrick Garland said regarding the operation in a statement.
