叙利亚电子军的"白宫爆炸案大捷"

When the Syrian Electronic Army managed to hack the Twitter account of the Associated Press and sneak out a false report of explosions at the White House to the news agency’s 1.9m followers it scored its biggest coup to date.

当“叙利亚电子军”（Syrian Electronic Army，简称SEA）成功侵入美联社(AP)的Twitter账号，并向这个帐号的190万名粉丝发布白宫爆炸的假消息时，它获得了它历史上最重大的一次胜利。

The report caused a brief but sharp dip in the US stock market. It also illustrated how the Syrian hackers, who target entities opposed to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, could use relatively simple techniques to turn their gadfly disruptions into something more menacing.

这条假消息导致美国股市出现短暂而剧烈的下跌。它显示出，叙利亚黑客可以运用相对简单的技术，将平常的网络干扰升级成更具威胁的攻击。这些黑客以反对总统巴沙尔•阿萨德(Bashar al-Assad)政权的实体为攻击对象。

“When you start to do things that have a big impact on the stock market, you are getting away from hacking and moving much closer to something that resembles an actual cyber attack on the US – which takes things into a different area altogether,” said one former US official involved in cyber security.

一位曾负责网络安全事务的前美国官员表示：“当你做的事情对股市产生重大影响时，你做的就不再是一般的黑客袭击，而是更接近于对美国发起的一场网络攻击，这就让事情的性质完全变了样。”

The leading S and P 500 share index briefly plunged almost 1 per cent on Tuesday after the false post on the AP Twitter account, which claimed that President Barack Obama had been injured in a double blast in the White House.

周二，美联社Twitter账号发布的白宫发生两起爆炸、致使美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)受伤的假消息，让美国主要股指——标普500指数一度暴跌近1%。

While AP said it had been hacked, the claimed Syrian Electronic Army Twitter feed crowed: “Ops! @AP get owned by Syrian Electronic Army! #SEA #Syria #ByeByeObama.”

在美联社宣布遭受黑客攻击之后，SEA宣称对此负责，并兴高采烈地发帖称：“噢，叙利亚电子军接管了美联社Twitter账户。#SEA#叙利亚#再见奥巴马。”

The attack is the latest and most infamous in a string of such actions by the SEA since the start more than two years ago of the Syrian conflict , which has claimed more than 70,000 lives. Other alleged targets have included Harvard University, the Qatar-government-funded television channel Al Jazeera, and the BBC weather site, which posted praise for Mr Assad in its Twitter feed last month.

自两年多前叙利亚冲突爆发以来，SEA发起了一系列黑客攻击活动，最新这次袭击是最为恶劣的一起。其他据称遭受袭击的机构包括哈佛大学(Harvard University)、卡塔尔政府资助的半岛电视台(Al Jazeera)以及英国广播公司(BBC)天气预报网站。上个月，SEA曾一度控制BBC天气预报的Twitter账号，并发布了赞扬阿萨德的帖子。叙利亚冲突已导致逾7万人丧生。

Analysts say the SEA is at the least tacitly supported by Mr Assad’s regime and is hosted on Syria’s national computer network, which remains under government control. Mr Assad – who was president of the Syrian Computer Society before he rose to national power in 2000 – has publicly praised the SEA’s work.

分析人士表示，SEA肯定受到阿萨德政权的某种暗中支持，其网站托管在叙利亚国家计算机网络的服务器之上——后者依然处于政府控制之下。阿萨德曾公开赞扬SEA的工作。在2000年执掌全国政权之前，阿萨德曾担任叙利亚计算机协会(Syrian Computer Society)会长。

Sean Sullivan, a researcher at F-Secure, a Helsinki-based electronic security company, said the SEA’s martial pretensions and fondness for altering websites resembled the activities of hackers in neighbouring Turkey.

F-Secure的研究员肖恩•沙利文(Sean Sullivan)表示，SEA的军队做派和篡改网站的偏好，与其邻国土耳其的黑客活动有些类似。F-Secure是一家总部位于赫尔辛基的电子安全公司。

“There is a long history in Turkey of clubs where people give themselves ranks of lieutenant-general and colonel,” he said. “So it could easily cross over the border into Syria.”

他说：“土耳其黑客们喜欢自封为中将和上校。这种习惯很容易越过边境传到叙利亚。”

The SEA says it supports the Assad regime but denies being part of it. In an email interview, an individual contacted via the purported electronic army Twitter feed said the group was made up of “Syrian youth [who] want to defend their country”.

SEA表示支持阿萨德政权，但否认是其下属机构。记者通过一个据称是SEA的Twitter账户联系上其中一名成员，并通过电子邮件进行了采访。这位成员表示，该组织是由“希望保卫自己国家的叙利亚年轻人”组成的。

The person, who did not give a name and signed the email as “Th3Pr0”, said the electronic army had attacked targets in western and Gulf countries over their support for anti-Assad rebels. Operations had focused lately on the US media, in retaliation for US sanctions on Syria that had caused an internet service provider to shut down the SEA’s main website, Th3Pr0 added.

这位成员没有透露自己的姓名，在邮件中用使用的落款是“Th3Pr0”。他表示，SEA已向西方和海湾国家的一些目标发动袭击，因为后者向反对阿萨德的叛军提供了支持。他补充称，最近的袭击主要针对美国媒体，以作为对美国制裁叙利亚的报复。由于美国制裁，一家互联网服务提供商已经关闭了SEA的主网站。

“All the countries who support the terrorists groups in Syria are targets for us – their media/government website/social media accounts,” said Th3Pr0. “Our demands [are] to stop suspending our accounts and domain names so we can enjoy the ‘Freedom speech of America’.”

Th3Pr0表示：“所有支持叙利亚境内恐怖组织的国家都是我们的袭击目标——它们的媒体、政府、网站和社交媒体账号等。我们的要求（是）解禁我们的账号和域名，让我们享受到‘美国的言论自由’。”

Analysts say the electronic army appears to have developed a greater sense of purpose and has expanded its hacking repertoire, although they are sceptical of the group’s claims that it is mounting more sophisticated attacks by using malware or assaulting web servers.

分析人士表示，SEA似乎已变得更有针对性，攻击手段更加丰富。但对于该组织宣称的将实施更复杂攻击的说法——或者通过使用恶意软件，或者通过攻击网络服务器——分析人士表示怀疑。

“They moved from defacing websites to focusing on compromising high-profile, widely followed Twitter accounts,” said Helmi Noman, a researcher at Citizen Lab, a University of Toronto group that focuses on the intersection of digital media, global security and human rights. “SEA’s power now is not on the sophistication of their tools, but their ability to capitalise on the security vulnerabilities of both [the] Twitter access system, and also Twitter account operators.”

公民实验室(Citizen Lab)的研究员海尔米•诺曼(Helmi Noman)说：“他们已从在网站上‘涂抹’，转变为攻击粉丝众多的知名Twitter账号。目前SEA的厉害之处不是其攻击手段有多复杂，而是它能够利用Twitter登陆系统和Twitter账户运营商的安全漏洞发起攻击。”公民实验室是多伦多大学(University of Toronto)下属的一家致力于研究数字媒体、全球安全和人权活动相互影响问题的组织。

The SEA denies responsibility for what Syrian activists say is the planting by the regime of malware on their computers. But the pro-government hackers have still been publicly waging cyber war against Assad regime opponents.

叙利亚人权活动家声称，SEA在他们的电脑上植入了恶意软件。SEA对此予以否认，但这些亲政府的黑客们仍公开与阿萨德政权的反对者大打网络战。

After the hacking group Anonymous claimed in 2011 to have taken down the website of the Syrian defence ministry, the electronic army responded by posting images on an Anonymous website.

2011年，黑客组织Anonymous侵入了叙利亚国防部的网站，SEA随即还以颜色，侵入Anonymous的一家网站并挂上一些图片。

For now, the SEA appears to be taking delight in its freshly proved capacity to cause mischief, posting a series of defiant tweets about its claimed past triumphs, even as it flitted from one Twitter account – suspended in the wake of Tuesday’s attack – to another.

就目前而言，SEA似乎对于刚刚证明了自己的破坏能力而感到高兴，在Twitter上就“辉煌战绩”发布了一系列挑衅性言论。不过，由于其账号在周二袭击活动之后被关闭，他们不得不换了另一个Twitter账号。

“Seventh account of Syrian Electronic Army on #Twitter,” proclaimed the main new feed.

他们在新的Twitter主账号上宣称：“这是叙利亚电子军的第7个Twitter账号。”