The Jeff Bezos affair and the vulnerability of millionaires to hackers – 02/10/2019

Not even the richest man in the world could stop being hacked into an intimate selfie. The revelation of Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, to whom a tabloid illegally obtained his bad photo This shows that billionaires do not escape the tentacles of computer intrusions either.

"No one is immune to online exploitation," says Mark Johnson, head of the Sovereign Intelligence computer security company.

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For this expert, billionaires and great businessmen are particularly vulnerable because your personal information is a gold mine for criminals, intelligence agencies and competitors. According to him, these different actors bet that the stolen data will allow them to better understand piracy innovations and strategies.

"Getting your personal information is like getting the keys to the realm," Johnson said.

"If the National Enquirer (tabloid) has pictures of Jeff Bezos' penis, do not tell me that China does not have the IP address (a number identifying a network device) and the strategy of Amazon, "wrote Ian Bremmer, founder of the Eurasia Group of experts.

Since the revelations of Bezos, whose fortune is estimated at more than 130 000 million dollars, computer security experts consulted by AFP declare to have noticed an increase in the orders of holders of large fortunes verify that their systems and peripherals have not been hacked.

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"The current threats do not necessarily aim to penetrate the walls of the castle because they are already inside, especially on personal devices, and experience has shown that it takes eight months for an intrusion to be detected, "says Kris Coleman, founder of Red Five Security.

In this era of superconnection, much of the security of wealth holders has moved away from ultra-sophisticated bodyguards and alarms to the benefit of risk management to protect property, the image and their "heritage." "because more and more personal information is stored online: social security number, bank details, health certificates, driver's license number, personal address, etc.

Normally, large fortunes have a computer security service and also use external companies to regularly evaluate their devices, because many computer attacks are detected by third parties, according to observers.

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Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, $ 7.3 million spent on security in 2017, against 4.2 million in 2015, astronomical sum that the social network considers as normal because of "its rank and its importance". Last July, the company also said it would allocate an additional $ 10 million a year to strengthen its security.

"Protection against an internal conspiracy, especially from trusted people, or against an intelligence agency that tries to attack from the outside requires a significant investment, a lot of experience and vigilance," said Kris Coleman, who does not want to share the intelligence measures adopted for your customers.

For Johnson, the former US Navy research service, "no personal data is really well protected", especially because the data of large fortunes are often centralized through the "family offices" (management companies of the US Navy). heritage), which often do not have sophisticated technological tools such as information encryption.

The American news site Splinter published Monday racist emails from billionaire Joe Ricketts, founder of the TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. brokerage firm, without indicating how they were obtained.

In these exchanges, some of which date back to 2009, Ricketts manifests his Islamophobia and is a follower of conspiracy theories. The affected person is excused after posting the messages.

In August, a cyberattack against Ashley-Madison, an extra-marital dating site, revealed that American millionaire Dan Loeb had an account. ).

Bezos did not say how the National Enquirer had obtained his photo but, according to experts, the most common procedure is to impersonate a member of the environment.

"The opponent often sends a message to the target asking him to click on a link that appears in the mail," says Coleman.

Source: AFP