Leonid Bershidsky — How Russian Hackers Became a Kremlin Headache

Leonid Bershidsky adds some more (possible) pieces to the puzzle.

Bloomberg View
How Russian Hackers Became a Kremlin Headache
Leonid Bershidsky

Brian Krebs — A Shakeup in Russia’s Top Cybercrime Unit

Update in the cyber situation in Russia. There has been some more information coming out but the translations from Russian have been rough, so I haven't put it up. This is an American cyber security guy familiar with the situation. It's the most comprehensive report available so far.

Warning. It's Byzantine and still a labyrinth. Not clear yet what is going on.

Krebs on Security
A Shakeup in Russia’s Top Cybercrime Unit

Brian Krebs, Krebs Security

The Moscow Times — Second FSB Agent Arrested for Treason Revealed as Notorious Hacker

More information developing on arrest of hackers in Russia. The FSB is the Russian government internal security service, which comparable to the FBI in the US.

More information than before, but the picture is still unclear and the Russian authorities have not clarified yet.

The Moscow Times in an English language paper, but the translation from Russian of the second seems to be originated by machine rather than the work of a competent human translator. 

The Moscow Times
Second FSB Agent Arrested for Treason Revealed as Notorious Hacker

5 Hot News
Hacker in uniform: the famous third defendant in the case of treason to the FSB

Alexander Mercouris — Straight out of a spy film: here’s why Obama’s attributions of the Clinton hacks to Russia’s GRU and FSB don’t add up

Backgrounder on Russian intelligence services.

There are four Russian intelligence agencies which are publicly known, though there are certainly others. These are the GRU (“Main Intelligence Directorate”), the FSB (“Federal Security Service”), the SVR (“Foreign Intelligence Service”) and the FSO (“Federal Protective Service”), which incorporates Spetssvyaz (“Special Communications Service”), which is Russia’s equivalent to the NSA.

Contrary to some claims, I am sure all four of these intelligence agencies undertake electronic and signals intelligence, certainly up to the level needed to carry out the DNC and Podesta hacks. However given the large claims that are being made about the hacking – extending all the way to President Putin’s personal involvement – I would have thought that of Russia’s four intelligence agencies the GRU and the FSB are the two least likely to have carried the hacking out.…

The key point about the GRU is however that it is the intelligence agency of the General Staff of Russia’s Armed Forces. It is therefore a military intelligence agency whose personnel are serving officers of the Russian military. Its closest approximate US equivalent is the Defense Intelligence Agency (“DIA”).…

As for the FSB, its primary roles as an intelligence agency are supposed to be counter-espionage and counter-terrorism carried out on the territory of Russia, though it is sometimes claimed to have a foreign intelligence role in the other countries that were formerly part of the USSR such as Ukraine.…

Not only do both the SVR and Spetssvyaz specialise in foreign political intelligence of precisely the sort involved in the DNC and Podesta leaks, but since Russia is accused of electronic hacking, this would seem to fall squarely within Spetssvyaz’s remit...

… I can’t escape the feeling that the reason the Obama administration and the Western media have latched on to the FSB and the GRU as the two agencies they accuse of the hacking is because of all of Russia’s intelligence agencies they are by the far best known and most notorious, having been the subject of countless media stories and spy thrillers, including in the case of the FSB a James Bond film, and in the case of the GRU countless thrillers extending all the way back into the Cold War....

By contrast to the Western public the names SVR and especially Spetssvyaz mean little....

The Duran

Straight out of a spy film: here’s why Obama’s attributions of the Clinton hacks to Russia’s GRU and FSB don’t add up
Alexander Mercouris

Alexander Mercouris — Cyber-war starting? Russia’s FSB warns of massive cyber-attack on Russian banks on Monday

The FSB has not identified the “foreign intelligence agencies” that are supposedly preparing this attack. However the fact that a Ukrainian company is involved and that the servers and command centres are located in the Netherlands – a NATO state – obviously points in the direction of Ukraine and NATO.

This FSB warning of course comes after US threats to launch cyber-warfare against Russia in connection with the DNC and Podesta leaks.

Though this is the sum total of the information the FSB has publicly provided, it is possible to say more.

Firstly, this would not be the first large scale attempt to destabilise the Russian banking system.

German Gref, the CEO of Sberbank – Russia’s largest bank – has previously said that Sberbank was the target of a what looks like a very similar attack at the height of the rouble crisis in December 2014....

The last point to make about this affair is that it is very interesting that the FSB has apparently been able to detect the preparations for this attack so far in advance. On the face of it this is a notable counter-espionage success. One wonders how it was done.

The Duran

Cyber-war starting? Russia’s FSB warns of massive cyber-attack on Russian banks on Monday

Alexander Mercouris

RT — ISIS rooted in Arab Spring, gained momentum due to double standards - Russian Security Service head

Islamic State evolved from the Arab Spring and gained momentum due to the duplicity of certain world powers, the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has told a meeting of top security heads of ex-Soviet states (CIS) in Moscow on Wednesday.

There are world powers that are using Islamic State (IS, former ISIL/ISIS) as a kind of “terror battering ram” to ensure their interests in Asia and Africa, said FSB director Aleksandr Bortnikov. In pursuing their goals with IS, these countries have put the world on the verge of a global religious and civilizational crisis, he added.…

RT
ISIS rooted in Arab Spring, gained momentum due to double standards - Russian Security Service head

Anna Veligzhanina — Nemtsov's killer was hired by the commander of Dzhokhar Dudaev Battalion in Ukraine, Adam Osmaev

Fresh developments in the Nemtsov case.

Fort Russ
Nemtsov's killer was hired by the commander of Dzhokhar Dudaev Battalion in Ukraine, Adam Osmaev

Translated by Kristina Rus

If you read Russian, Anna Veligzhanina for Komsomolskaya Pravda

Fort Russ — Nemtsov Murder: Case Closed?

Russian media is widely reporting that Nemtsov's murder was master-minded and carried out by Zaur Dadayev (pictured above) who had already made a confession. The motive for the killing was reported as Nemtsov's stance on the Charlie Hebdo incident, and his criticism of Islam, Muslims, and the President of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov.
Kadyrov, for his part, sought take some of the heat off Dadayev, who after all was a decorated combat veteran who had risked his life in combat against Islamist militants in the Caucasus.

Is that the end of the story? We may never really know. On the face of it, the explanation offered is not wholly implausible. It may well be that Dadayev felt Kadyrov, who was quite outspoken in his criticism of Nemtsov and other Russian neo-liberals, might approve of this act even though he had not ordered it.

It is more likely that Dadayev is genuinely responsible for the crime, but that he is not revealing his true motives or instigators of the murder....

Fort Russ

Nemtsov Murder: Case Closed?

J.Hawk

Also

Red Pill Times
Suspect detained in the Boris Nemtsov murder has pleaded guilty to the crime. Another suspect officially charged

alexrpt

The Vineyard of the Saker
Important developments in the Nemtsov murder case (UPDATED)
The Saker

Interpreter — Suspects Detained from the North Caucasus in the Murder of Boris Nemtsov

More details here than in other reports.

Russia Update: March 7, 2015
Suspects Detained from the North Caucasus in the Murder of Boris Nemtsov
Interpreter_Mag

Ellen Brown — Bail-In and the Financial Stability Board: The Global Bankers’ Coup

On December 11, 2014, the US House passed a bill repealing the Dodd-Frank requirement that risky derivatives be pushed into big-bank subsidiaries, leaving our deposits and pensions exposed to massive derivatives losses. The bill was vigorously challenged by Senator Elizabeth Warren; but the tide turned when Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorganChase, stepped into the ring. Perhaps what prompted his intervention was the unanticipated $40 drop in the price of oil. As financial blogger Michael Snyder points out, that drop could trigger a derivatives payout that could bankrupt the biggest banks. And if the G20’s new “bail-in” rules are formalized, depositors and pensioners could be on the hook. 

The new bail-in rules were discussed in my last post here. They are edicts of the Financial Stability Board (FSB), an unelected body of central bankers and finance ministers headquartered in the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland. Where did the FSB get these sweeping powers, and is its mandate legally enforceable? 

Those questions were addressed in an article I wrote in June 2009, two months after the FSB was formed, titled “Big Brother in Basel: BIS Financial Stability Board Undermines National Sovereignty.” It linked the strange boot shape of the BIS to a line from Orwell’s 1984: “a boot stamping on a human face—forever.” The concerns raised there seem to be materializing, so I’m republishing the bulk of that article here. We need to be paying attention, lest the bail-in juggernaut steamroll over us unchallenged.

Using state capture to institutionalize capitalizing gains and socializing losses through the force of law.

Web of Debt
Bail-In and the Financial Stability Board: The Global Bankers’ Coup
Ellen Brown