West unites to expose Russian spy attacks

Among targets of the GRU attacks were the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada), transport systems in Ukraine and democratic elections, such as the 2016 USA presidential race, according to the NCSC.

Well, we now know what she means.

"The GRU's actions are reckless and indiscriminate: they try to undermine and interfere in elections" in a clear assault on Western democracy, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said in releasing the report.

In 2016, the Russian military intelligence service officers (GRU) are accused of hacking the Canada-based World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and releasing confidential athlete data; as well as compromising the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport with malware. The International Paralympic Committee imposed a blanket ban on Russian athletes in its 2016 games.

"Where Russia acts in an indiscriminate and reckless way, where they have done in terms of these cyberattacks, we will be exposing them", Williamson told reporters in Brussels at talks with U.S. Defence Secretary Jim Mattis and their North Atlantic Treaty Organisation counterparts. If that unsuccessful, the hackers would conduct "on-site" or "close access" hacking operations with trained GRU members traveling with sophisticated equipment to target their victims through wifi networks.

The GRU, Britain said, was nearly certainly behind the BadRabbit and World Anti-Doping Agency attacks, the hack of the U.S. Democratic National Committee (DNC) in 2016 and the theft of emails from a United Kingdom -based TV station in 2015.

Ollie Whitehouse, global chief technical officer at information assurance firm NCC Group, commented: "The techniques used by the GRU are varied, and their tradecraft is evolving".

Fancy Bear is a nickname for a GRU hacking group. They then selectively leaked stolen information to the public and the media-in some cases in doctored or misleading form. In some instances, WADA documents were altered, officials said. Officials said the men were expelled from the country following the alleged cyber attack.

"The use of bitcoin allowed the conspirators to avoid direct relationships with traditional financial institutions, allowing them to evade greater scrutiny of their identities and sources of funds", it said. "The worldwide community - including Russian Federation - has agreed that global law and norms of responsible state behavior apply in cyberspace", Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison said. The GRU does not comment publicly on its actions.

Alexei Morenetz and Yevgeny Serebriakov were described by officials as "cyberoperators". Also charged were Oleg Sotnikov, 46, and Alexey Minin, 46.

The indictments include charges of money laundering, using virtual currencies like bitcoin, wire fraud and identify theft.

The OPCW is carrying out forensic tests in the investigation into the poisoning of the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury on March 4.

"They were clearly not here on holiday", the head of the Dutch intelligence service said on Thursday. In the trunk, officials said, were Wi-Fi hacking tools.

The latest developments comes after Britain accused the Russian military intelligence agency of a spate of cyber attacks, from the hack against the 2016 U.S. elections to the leaking of top athletes' medical records. That attack left four people fighting for their lives and one woman dead. Three of the seven officials that are named in this specific indictment (Yermakov, Malyshev and Badin) were also named by Mueller as interfering in the 2016 United States election. It blamed Russian Federation for the theft and subsequent release of confidential athletes' medical files from the World Anti-Doping Agency.