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Obama and McCain Campaigns Infiltrated by Foreign Hackers

by Terrence O'Brien on November 6, 2008 at 05:40 PM



Newsweek revealed yesterday that computers at both the Obama and McCain campaigns were hacked by a "foreign entity" during the campaign. Though the intrusions -- which started last summer and continued through September and October -- were detected by the campaigns, they were initially thought to be a simple virus or phishing attack. The day following the hacks, the FBI and Secret Service approached the Obama campaign and told them, "You have a problem way bigger than what you understand."

The end result was that the systems were compromised and large numbers of files were downloaded by the attacker or attackers. The FBI and the White House believe that the stolen information was related to policy positions and may be used to gain leverage over a future administration in negotiations. Agents assured the campaign that the attack did not originated with their political opponents. According to the report in Newsweek, the Obama team has speculated that the attack originated from China or Russia. To combat the intrustion, a security firm was hired to quickly plug up the holes in the campaign's computers.

The extent of the information obtained is not known, but judging from Bush's Chief of Staff Josh Bolton's comment to Obama Campaign Manager David Plouffe ("You have a real problem ... and you have to deal with it"), the FBI will be working tirelessly to find and out the culprits. [From: Newsweek]

Tags: barack obama, BarackObama, breaking news, BreakingNews, elections, fbi, hacker, hackers, john mccain, JohnMccain, mccain, obama, politics, security

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