Reuters: Technology News: Iranian Gmail users targeted in pre-election hacking campaign -Google

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Iranian Gmail users targeted in pre-election hacking campaign -Google Jun 13th 2013, 01:43 Tweet Share this Email Print Related News Across Asia, officials' e-mails may be vulnerable 6:29am EDT U.S. tech firms push for government transparency on security Tue, Jun 11 2013 Internet giants deny granting government 'direct access' to servers Thu, Jun 6 2013 Syria government supporters hack Financial Times Fri, May 17 2013 Analysis & Opinion Iranians mixed on having religious figures in politics: Pew poll U.S. online spying leak could harm Silicon Valley A customer uses a computer at an internet cafe in Tehran May 9, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Raheb Homavandi By Gerry Shih SAN FRANCISCO | Wed Jun 12, 2013 9:43pm EDT SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Gmail accounts belonging to Iranian users have been targeted in an extensive hacking campaign in the weeks leading up to the country's closely watched presidential elections on Friday, Google Inc said on Wednesday. The U.S. Internet company, which described the attacks as broad "email-based phishing" attempts seeking to trick unsuspecting Gmail users into giving up their user names and passwords, said they originated in Iran and appeared to be "politically motivated in connection with the Iranian presidential election on Friday." Google said it has a policy to alert users to "state-sponsored attacks and other suspicious activity," but did not identify the perpetrators beyond saying that it appeared to be the same group behind a Gmail hacking campaign in 2011 involving fraudulent digital certificates. The most recent phishing campaigns began almost three weeks ago, Google said. The "timing and targeting of the campaigns" suggested a connection to the election, Google said without elaborating. On its security blog on Wednesday, the company posted a screenshot of a phishing email purporting to be from Google administrators. The email, sent from the account "Email.Settings@gmail.com," contained a link to a fake sign-in page that asked for the user's Gmail credentials. "Protecting our users' accounts is one of our top priorities, so we notify targets of state-sponsored attacks and other suspicious activity, and we take other appropriate actions to limit the impact of these attacks on our users," Google said. In 2011, a young Iranian student who claimed credit for hacking Gmail accounts belonging to anti-government dissidents told the international press that he acted out of patriotism but denied any connection to the Iranian government. (Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Mohammad Zargham) Tweet this Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/ Comments (0) Be the first to comment on reuters.com. Add yours using the box above.

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