Russian hackers accused of targeting U.S. intelligence community with spear phishing campaign

Washington — Russia-based hackers conducted a sophisticated cyber campaign against American intelligence officials, including contractors at the State and Defense Departments, as part of an international operation that included NATO members and Ukraine, the Justice Department alleged Thursday.

Prosecutors accused an officer in Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) and another co-defendant of carrying out a spear phishing campaign between October 2016 and October 2022 against current and former employees of the U.S. intelligence community, defense contractors and Energy Department facilities.

Ruslan Aleksandrovich Peretyatko — the FSB officer — and Andrey Stanislavovich Korinets, who are both part of an organization known as the Callisto Group, allegedly used spoof email accounts that appeared to be from legitimate individuals to trick victims into providing their login credentials in order to access their email accounts, according to a federal indictment unsealed in California.