Kash Patel at the White House
Private photographs and hundreds of messages released. Anyone with information that helps catch the Handala Hack Team wins up to 10 million dollars.
A group of hackers linked to Iran have compromised the FBI director’s personal Gmail account, Kash Pateland released private photographs and hundreds of email messages online.
The authorship of the intrusion was claimed by the group Handala Hack Teamwhich stated on its website that Patel would join the list of its “successfully hacked victims”.
Among the published contents are personal images of the FBI director, including photographs in informal contexts, as well as a sample of but 300 emails which, according to the attackers who identify themselves as pro-Palestinian resistance, cover personal and professional correspondence exchanged between 2010 and 2019.
“This is just the beginning”, wrote the group, quoted by .
The FBI confirmed that Patel’s personal account was targeted. In a statement, spokesman Ben Williamson said the agency took “all necessary steps” to mitigate potential risks associated with the incident and stressed that the data in question is “historical in nature” and does not include government information.
The FBI is offering up to 10 million dollars to anyone who provides information that helps identify the members of the hacker group.
The company reports that it was unable to independently authenticate the content of the messages released. Still, the Gmail address that Handala says it hacked matches an address previously associated with Patel in past data breaches, according to the company District 4 Labs, which specializes in dark web monitoring. Google, which owns Gmail, did not respond to requests for comment.
Handala presents itself as a collective of pro-Palestinian vigilante hackers, but Western investigators consider it to be one of the identities used by Iranian state cyberespionage units. The group had recently claimed an attack on the North American company Strykerin the medical devices and services sector. On Thursday, he also said he had released personal data on dozens of Lockheed Martin employees stationed in the Middle East.
