After the disclosure by mistake to a journalist The Atlantic of American military operations in Yemen in a signal group, the American administration sees red again. German magazine Der Spiegel revealed Wednesday, March 26, having carried out research allowing him to access mobile phone numbers, electronic addresses and, in some cases, passwords of senior American officials. Private contact details are simply accessible on the internet, says Der Spiegelwho explains having “used search engines for commercial people as well as data from hacked customers and published on the web”.
In particular, the National Security Councilor Mike Waltz, the American intelligence head of the American intelligence Tupsi Gabbard and the head of the Pentagon Pete Hegseth – are the highest in terms of security.
Accounts still used
“The passwords and accounts mentioned in this reported leak (by Der Spiegeleditor’s note) were changed before the National Security Advisor Mike Waltz arrived at Congress in 2019, “a spokesman for the National Security Council reacted to AFP.
However, according to German magazine, most of these issues and email addresses are apparently still used by those concerned and are for example linked to profiles on Instagram and Linkedin. They were used to create Dropbox accounts, a cloud storage service, and profiles in applications that record running data. The numbers of Tulsi Gabbard and Mike Waltz would even be linked to accounts on the WhatsApp and even signal messaging services.
THE Spiegel Explains that it was “particularly easy for journalists” to recover the mobile phone number and the email address of advisor Mike Waltz and Peter Hegseth, Minister of American Defense, by speaking “to a sales supplier of contact information”, this kind of service being generally used by companies for marketing and recruitment. By sending the LinkedIn account link by Peter Hegseth, the journalists received in return “a Gmail address and a mobile phone number, as well as other information”. Worse, this email, still used “only a few days ago”, and in some cases the associated password, were found “in more than 20 leaks accessible to the public”. For Mike Waltz, the information collected also made it possible to come across profiles on “Microsoft Teams, Linkedin, Whatsapp and Signal” and for Tulsi Gabbard, an active WhatsApp account and a signal profile.
Possible spy software
According to the magazine, “hostile intelligence services could use this data accessible to the public to hack the communications of the persons concerned by installing spy software on their devices”. He is even “conceivable”, to Der Spiegel“that foreign agents were aware of the signal discussion group in which Gabbard, Waltz and Hegseth discussed a military attack” and where the editor of chief of The AtlanticJeffrey Goldberg was added by mistake.
The American magazine has since unveiled the details of the messages, some of the senior officials involved having denied that confidential information had been shared on Wednesday. The plan of attack concerned Houthi targets in Yemen, strikes carried out on March 15 and which, according to the Houthis, about fifty dead and a hundred wounded.
Questioned by the Spiegelthe three officials did not react at this stage to these embarrassing new revelations.