Tech Legal: Hackers steal medical data of US Olympic stars like Biles & Srena

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Hackers steal medical data of US Olympic stars

The World Anti-Doping Agency said Tuesday that Russian hackers broke into its database, stealing medical data of Olympic stars including gold medal gymnast Simone Biles and tennis player Venus Williams.
The cyber criminal group known as "Tsar Team" and "Fancy Bear" publicly released some of the stolen data and threatened to leak more in the future. The same group is thought to have been behind the Democratic National Committee hack in June -- which released sensitive political strategy and led to the resignation of the committee chairman.


On the website, which CNN cannot confirm as legitimate, Fancy Bears offered a message which said in part, "Greetings citizens of the world. Allow us to introduce ourselves. We are Fancy Bears' international hack team. We stand for fair play and clean sport."

The hackers said, "We will also disclose exclusive information about other national Olympic teams later. Wait for sensational proof of famous athletes taking doping substances any time soon."

USA Gymnastics said in a statement that among the files breached were the drug testing results for Biles, who won four gold medals in the Rio games last month. The group said that Biles "was approved for a therapeutic-use exemption" of certain drugs and "has not broken any drug-testing regulations, including at the Olympic Games in Rio."

Biles tweeted that she has ADHD and said that she believes in clean sport and has always followed the rules.

"Having ADHD, and taking medicine for it is nothing to be ashamed of nothing that I'm afraid to let people know," she wrote.

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Simone Biles

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She was supported by USA Gymnastics.

"Simone has filed the proper paperwork per USADA (U.S. Anti-Doping Agency) and WADA requirements, and there is no violation," said Steve Penny, president of USA Gymnastics.

Venus Williams issued a statement acknowledging her drug test results had been hacked and said that she had also been granted "therapeutic use exemptions," although she doesn't cite the reason for the exemption.

"I am one of the strongest supporters of maintaining the highest level of integrity in competitive sport and I have been highly disciplined in following the guidelines," she wrote.

The drug testing results for star basketball player Elena Delle Donne were also revealed in the hack. "I'd like to thank the hackers for making the world aware that I legally take a prescription for a condition I've been diagnosed with, which WADA granted me an exemption for. Thanks, guys!" she posted.

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Elena Delle Donne

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Quick update!

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USADA CEO Travis Tygart said the athletes are being wrongly smeared.

"In each of the situations, the athlete has done everything right in adhering to the global rules for obtaining permission to use a needed medication," he said.

WADA's database was accessed through an account created by the International Olympic Committee for the Rio games, WADA said.

In a statement, WADA claims a cyber-espionage group obtained the information through phishing of email accounts, which allowed hackers to obtain passwords to WADA's database, after receiving fake emails from an address known to the recipient, asking for sensitive information.

The Russian government denied any involvement in the hack, according to a statement from Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov, which was reported by the state run media agency TASS.

"We can say without a hesitation any involvement in such actions on the part of official Moscow, the Russian government or any Russian secret services is strictly out of the question. It's simply ruled out," Peskov said.

This is not the first time WADA was targeted. The anti-doping agency database account ofwhistleblower Yuliya Stepanova was hacked in August. The runner helped expose the scale of Russian doping problems last year.

"WADA condemns these ongoing cyber-attacks that are being carried out in an attempt to undermine WADA and the global anti-doping system," said Olivier Niggli, the agency's director general.

He added that the hack is "greatly compromising the effort by the global anti-doping community to re-establish trust in Russia."

Related: Pro athletes and the things they trademark

WADA is not popular in Russia. It had recommended banning all Russian athletes from the Rio 2016 games, after an independent report said the country operated a state-sponsored doping program during the 2014 Sochi Winter Games. Russian officials and athletes likened the move to Cold War era conflicts.

The International Olympic Committee didn't issue a blanket ban on Russian athletes in Rio, leaving the decision on competitors' eligibility up to their respective sporting federations.

Many Russian track and field athletes and were banned from competing by their sports' governing bodies after the International Olympic Committee set strict anti-doping standards.

http://money.cnn.com/2016/09/13/news/wada-hacked-russian-spies/index.html?iid=surge-story-summary

 

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[TimRock]

hackers failed, because everything they took was legal.

 

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http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/20...t-medical-files-biles-serena-williams-n647571

Hackers linked to the Russian government have posted online what they say are the Olympic drug-testing files of four U.S. athletes, including Serena Williams and gymnastics champion Simone Biles.

The World Anti-Doping Agency confirmed Tuesday that a cyber-espionage group known as Fancy Bear illegally hacked its database of Olympic athletes for the 2016 Rio games, but had no comment on whether the files posted were authentic. NBC News has not confirmed that the files are authentic or, if authentic, are unaltered.

NBC News reported details of the suspected hack of WADA files Aug. 27, saying it was part of the same covert influence campaign by the Putin regime to target numerous U.S. government, political organizations and other perceived enemies and potentially disrupt the November election. U.S. officials have linked Fancy Bear to GRU, the Russian military intelligence agency.

Russian athletes were banned from the Rio Olympics — and Paralympics — after WADA's recommendation to ban them due to evidence of widespread doping.

In a detailed statement Tuesday, WADA confirmed a broad cyber-penetration of its Anti-doping Administration and Management System, known as the ADAMS database. It also said law enforcement authorities had traced the breach to hackers "originating out of Russia" known as Tsar Team (APT28), "also known as Fancy Bear," and that they had illegally gained access via an International Olympic Committee (IOC)-created account.

The hackers posted statements online claiming that they were going public with information about the U.S. athletes to show the U.S. won a large number of medals at the Olympics through cheating.

A post on the website Fancybear.net said the group was "shocked with what we saw" and that a review of hacked WADA files showed "that dozens of American athletes had tested positive" for banned substances, in cases in which they had been given official approval to use them due to extenuating circumstances.

"We are going to tell you how Olympic medals are won," it warned. "We will start with the U.S. team which has disgraced its name by tainted victories. We will also disclose exclusive information about other national Olympic teams later."

The website alleges that the U.S. athletes "got their licenses for doping …This is other evidence that WADA and IOC's Medical and Scientific Department are corrupt and deceitful."

The website said Biles, who won four gold medals in Rio, tested positive sometime in August 2016 after methylphenidate "was detected in her sample." The drug is sold under various trade names, including Ritalin, and commonly used to treat ADHD.

The site also alleged Serena Williams had taken painkillers and anti-inflammatories. NBC News does not have confirmation that the claim is accurate.

The site also posted what it said were files from Venus Williams and basketball player Elena Delle Donne.

Representatives of the athletes could not be immediately reached, but Simone Biles responded to the hack via Twitter.

"I have ADHD and have taken medicine for it since I was a kid. Please know, I believe in clean sport, have always followed the rules, and will continue to do so as fair play is critical to sport and is very important to me."

Elena Delle Donne also responded to the hack via Twitter: "I'd like to thank the hackers for making the world aware that I legally take a prescription for a condition I've been diagnosed with, which WADA granted me an exemption for. Thanks, guys!"

Travis Tygart, the head of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency also tweeted a statement. "It's unthinkable that in the Olympic movement," he said, "hackers would illegally obtain confidential medical information in an attempt to smear athletes to make it look as if they have done something wrong. The athletes haven't. In fact, in each of the situations, the athlete has done everything right in adhering to the global rules for obtaining permission to use a needed medication."

The purported files for Williams and Biles, for example, showed that the athletes had been granted exemptions for "therapeutic use," which is permitted under Olympic rules.

Tygart stopped short of saying the files were authentic.

In a statement, WADA Director General Olivier Niggli said the international organization "condemns these ongoing cyber-attacks that are being carried out in an attempt to undermine WADA and the global anti-doping system. ... WADA deeply regrets this situation and is very conscious of the threat that it represents to athletes whose confidential information has been divulged through this criminal act."

Added Niggli: "These criminal acts are greatly compromising the effort by the global anti-doping community to re-establish trust in Russia further to the outcomes of the Agency's independent McLaren Investigation Report."

A spokeswoman for WADA told NBC News that the anti-doping agency would have no further comment at this time.

Niggli said WADA was taking the hacks extremely seriously, cooperating with all relevant law enforcement agencies and doing internal and external security vulnerability checks. And, he said, "We are reaching out to stakeholders, such as the [International Olympic Committee and participating countries] regarding the specific athletes impacted."

While many key details were unavailable, the alleged posting of athlete information gained through the cyberintrusions appears to go beyond an incident in mid-August, when details about the hack of Russian athlete and whistleblower Yuliya Stepanova's ADAMS account was disclosed. As in Stepanova's case, WADA believes hackers illegally gained access to private accounts through "spearphishing" efforts to gained access to their passwords.

Initially, WADA said hackers never breached ADAMS or the accounts of other athletes besides Stepanova. In its Aug. 27 report, NBC News said personal information purporting to be from many other athletes had started mysteriously popping up online in mid-August.

U.S. security officials blame Fancy Bear for cyber-attacks on various Democratic Party organizations including the Democratic National Committee, as well as some accounts at the White House, State Department and the military's Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Russian officials have denied playing any role in the various hacks attributed to Fancy Bear and another hacking organization known as Cozy Bear that is believed to be sponsored by a separate Russian intelligence organization.