Russians hacked us – Microsoft

The US tech giant said cybercriminals got ahold of access to e-mail accounts of the company’s management

The presumed Russia-linked group Midnight Blizzard has attacked Microsoft’s corporate e-mail system, including accounts of the company's management, the tech giant claimed in a blog post on its website on Friday.

According to the US tech giant, the hacking group, also known as Nobelium, APT29, or Cozy Bear, hacked some corporate e-mail accounts, including those of the company’s “senior leadership team and employees in our cybersecurity, legal, and other functions.”

The attack, reportedly carried out at the end of November, was detected by the company’s security team on January 12. Microsoft said an investigation into the security breach was launched immediately after it discovered the intrusion.

The corporation said that hackers didn’t go after customer data but wanted to get information about themselves. More specifically, they wanted to find out what Microsoft knew about them.

“For Microsoft, this incident has highlighted the urgent need to move even faster. We will act immediately to apply our current security standards to Microsoft-owned legacy systems and internal business processes, even when these changes might cause disruption to existing business processes,” the company wrote.

READ MORE: Russia ‘hacked’ British politicians and journalists – UK Foreign Office

“This will likely cause some level of disruption while we adapt to this new reality, but this is a necessary step, and only the first of several we will be taking to embrace this philosophy.”

In the West, Midnight Blizzard is widely believed to be a hacking group that is linked to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR). It has been responsible for a series of high-profile attacks, such as those against SolarWinds in 2019, the Democratic National Committee in 2015, and many more.

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