People are silhouetted while posing with mobile devices in front of a screen designed with a Facebook logo, in this photo illustration taken in Zenica October 29, 2014. REUTERS / Dado Ruvic / File Photo
Facebook says it has disrupted a long-running cyber-espionage campaign run by Palestinian intelligence services, which features spies posing as journalists and the deployment of a captivated application to broadcast human rights articles.
In a report released on Wednesday, Facebook (FB.O) accused what it said was the cyber wing of the Palestinian Security Service (PSS), which is loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas, of conducting rudimentary hacking operations aimed at reporters, Palestinian activists, and dissidents, as well as other groups in Syria and other parts of the Middle East.
PSS spokesman Ikrimah Thabet dismissed Facebook’s allegations and said: “We respect the media, we work according to the law that governs our work and we work according to the law and order. We respect the freedoms, confidentiality and confidentiality of information.”
He said the service has good relations with Palestinian journalists and the journalists’ union.
Mike Dvilyanski, head of Facebook’s cyber espionage investigations, told Reuters before the report was published that the campaign’s methods were crude, but “we see them as persistent.”
PSS has intensified its activities in the last six months or so, Dvilyanski said. He said Facebook believed the organization had deployed about 300 fake or compromised accounts to target about 800 people in total.
None of the targets were identified by name. Facebook said it issued individual warnings to concerned users through its platform and removed dishonest accounts.
Assigning malicious activity online is notoriously difficult, but Dvilyanski said that the world’s largest social network “has more data points that link this cluster of activity to PSS and our confidence in this assignment is quite high.”
According to the Facebook report, the techniques used by PSS have largely focused on deceiving users into downloading spy software, for example by creating fake Facebook accounts with images of attractive young women. Facebook said the hackers also posed as journalists and in some cases tried to reach targets to download spyware disguised as secure chat apps or an app to send human rights articles for publication.
Some of their Facebook pages have posted memes, for example criticizing Russia’s foreign policy in the Middle East, to attract certain followers.
Facebook also said it was taking action against another long-running campaign linked to another hacking group, often called the “Arid Viper.” He did not say who was behind the group.
Facebook said Arid Viper had operated fake Facebook and Instagram accounts and more than a hundred malicious websites, and was expanding into iOS surveillance apps. The targets included Palestinian government officials and security forces, he said.
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