Cybersecurity

Mainstream Media Warns of 'Russian Malware', Ignores CIA's Own Virus Development

While the meme of omnipotent Russian hackers has been a recurrent one in the Western mainstream, supporting evidence has been scant. Conversely however, evidence of Western intelligence agencies employing sophisticated hacking techniques, and creating malicious software to attack citizens, is ample.

Homegrown Viruses

For instance, as part of its ‘Vault 7' series of exposures, whistleblower organisation WikiLeaks revealed how US Central Intelligence Agency contractor Raytheon Blackbird Technologies helped the CIA's Remote Development Branch (RDB) to collect ideas for developing their own advanced malware projects — and how the CIA's UMBRAGE malware development teams also borrowed codes from publicly available malware samples to build the Agency's own spyware tools.