Portuguese confidential NATO documents are reportedly for sale on the Dark Web
Confidential NATO documents from Portugal are circulating on the Dark Web after a cyberattack on the country’s highest military entity. The breach, reportedly in August 2022, was facilitated by using unsecure communication lines instead of the secure Integrated System of Military Communications. The attack was described as prolonged and stealthy, utilizing specialized bots to locate specific classified documents.
The Portuguese highest military body, the EMGFA, was the target of a cyberattack that resulted in the exfiltration of classified NATO documents. The documents in question are allegedly offered for sale on the Dark Web.
The local paper Diario de Noticias wrote about an incident that took place in August 2022. According to the article, US intelligence agencies informed Portugal’s government that hundreds of secret and private documents delivered by NATO to Portugal had been discovered for sale on the Dark Web.
Furthermore, the paper’s sources have explained that unsecure lines were used for receiving and forwarding classified documents instead of the more secure Integrated System of Military Communications (SICOM) system, allowing hackers easy access.
Other sources have suggested the attack was ‘prolonged in time and undetectable’, using unique bots that searched for the specific type of documents.
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