Ellen Nakashima

In what will stand as among the most definitive public accounts of the Kremlin’s attack on the American political system, the report of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation laid out in precise, chronological detail how “the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion.” The Russians’ goal, Mueller emphasized at several points, was to assist Donald Trump’s run for the White House and to damage Hillary Clinton’s candidacy.

British authorities arrested WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in response to an American extradition request, and a US federal court unsealed an indictment charging him with a single count of conspiracy to hack a classified Defense Department computer.  Assange was taken into custody by British police after Ecuador rescinded his asylum at its embassy in London, ending a media-saturated standoff that lasted nearly seven years.

US national security officials are planning for a future in which the Chinese firm Huawei will have a major share of the advanced global telecommunications market, and have begun to think about how to thwart potential espionage and disruptive cyberattacks enabled by interconnected networks. “We are going to have to figure out a way in a 5G world that we’re able to manage the risks in a diverse network that includes technology that we can’t trust,” said Sue Gordon, the deputy to the director of the US intelligence community.

The British government released a scathing assessment of the security risks posed by the Chinese telecom company Huawei to Britain’s telecom networks, as London weighs whether to heed US calls to bar the firm from the next-generation 5G network over fears it will enable spying by the Chinese government and potential cyberattacks.

The US military blocked Internet access to an infamous Russian entity seeking to sow discord among Americans during the 2018 midterms, several US officials said, a warning that the group’s operations against the United States are not cost-free. The strike on the Internet Research Agency in St.

The Justice Department announced criminal charges against Huawei, the world’s largest communications equipment manufacturer, and one of its top executives — a move likely to intensify trade tensions between the US and China. A 13-count indictment filed in New York City against Huawei, two of its affiliated firms, and its chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, accuses Huawei and an affiliate of bank fraud and wire fraud. The company is also charged with violating US sanctions on Iran and conspiring to obstruct justice related to the investigation.

The Justice Department unsealed charges against two Iranian criminal hackers who allegedly used ransomware to hit American hospitals, universities, government agencies and the city of Atlanta (GA), causing tens of millions of dollars in damages. More than 200 victims were affected, more than $6 million in ransom was collected and damages exceeded $30 million, officials said. Ransomware encrypts data on affected systems, with an offer to decrypt if a ransom is paid.

The Russian government is arguing that a federal court should dismiss a lawsuit brought by the Democratic National Committee alleging that Moscow’s military spies, the Trump campaign, and the WikiLeaks organization conspired to disrupt the 2016 campaign and tilt the election to Donald Trump. In a letter and statement to the State Department and a judge in the Southern District of New York, Russia’s Ministry of Justice argued that the United States’ Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act protects the Russian government from such lawsuits.

Although the decision remains under seal, a federal judge in California apparently ruled that the government cannot force Facebook to break the encryption on its popular Messenger voice app in a criminal case in which agents wanted to intercept a suspect’s conversations. The decision could be a setback for the Justice Department which sought to compel Facebook to figure out how to give it access to the encrypted communications.

The White House has “authorized offensive cyber operations” against US adversaries, in line with a new policy that eases the rules on the use of digital weapons to protect the nation, said National Security Adviser John Bolton. “Our hands are not tied as they were in the Obama administration,” Bolton said when unveiling a new national cyber strategy. He did not elaborate on the nature of the offensive operations or what specific malign behavior they were intended to counter.