What we should all be asking ourselves after today's mysterious cellular outage



Many Americans across the country woke up on Thursday morning without cell service — but there’s still no explanation for what caused the outage.

The most affected were AT&T customers with 50,000 outages officially reported at 7 a.m. EST, but some Verizon and T-Mobile customers were affected as well.

Now, Americans are left wondering whether or not it was a solar flare or a massive cyberattack — especially considering just yesterday there was a cyber attack on the cellular systems in Israel.

This was a small taste of what life would be like after such an attack, but a bigger attack could have devastating effects.

“One Second After” author William Forstchen has been warning about this for years.

“If you saw the number of attacks, incoming attacks on our infrastructure, on our military, it’s unrelenting,” Forstchen tells Glenn Beck. “This is just a foretaste of the future,” adding that we should be prepared for a cyber attack.

“Cyber attacks could include our water system, our electrical grid,” Glenn says, asking Forstchen how widespread this could be.

“It could be targeted to a specific or in a general offensive, like what I would call a first strike scenario,” Forstchen says. “For example, take where you are, suppose water all across the board was shut down for 48 hours because that’s all electronically controlled.”

“Would be very bad within 24 to 48 hours,” he adds.

“If you lose electricity, that’s the fundamental building block,” he continues. “Then everything goes. Water, food, medical, all of it.”


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Americans across the country are experiencing drops in cell service, in some cases hindering 911 calls



Tens of thousands of Americans awoke Thursday morning to discover their cell phones were bereft of signal. In addition to being unable to touch base with friends, families, and coworkers, some users apparently were unable to hail 911.

While those affected by the cascading cellular service outages appear to be predominantly AT&T customers, clients of other service providers are reportedly experiencing issues.

Around 3 a.m., there was a spike in reports of AT&T outages on the website Downdetector. As of 9:02 a.m. ET, there were over 73,000 reporters of customers experiencing service issues.

While Verizon, T-Mobile and other providers similarly saw spikes, Downdetector indicated they were orders of magnitude smaller. Verizon and T-Mobile maintain that their networks were unaffected and operating normally.

A spokesman for T-Mobile told CBS News, "Downdetector is likely reflecting challenges our customers were having attempting to connect to users on other networks."

"Some customers experienced issues this morning when calling or texting with customers served by another carrier," Verizon said in a statement obtained by the New York Times. "We are continuing to monitor the situation."

While AT&T has confirmed that it is experiencing rampant outages, it failed to provide an explanation for why the failure occurred in the first place, reported CNN.

"Some of our customers are experiencing wireless service interruptions this morning. We are working urgently to restore service to them," the company said in a statement. "We encourage the use of Wi-Fi calling until service is restored."

A spokesman for the company indicated further that AT&T's first responder network nevertheless remains operational.

The outages prompted some speculation online about possibly wicked causes, such as an electromagnetic pulse strike or a cyberattack; however, an industry source who spoke to CNN under the condition of anonymity suggested the issue is likely linked to a process known as peering, whereby cellphone services pass off calls from one network to the next.

CNN noted that the company was experiencing sporadic outages earlier this week, including a drop in 911 service in various southeastern states.

Blaze News reached out to AT&T for comment on the extent and cause of the outages as well as a projected timeline on a remedy but did not immediately receive a reply.

Various municipalities and local authorities across the country have confirmed the outages, in some cases highlighting corresponding difficulties reaching first responders by phone.

The City of Upper Arlington in Ohio noted that outages were affecting fire alarms, such that first responders "may not be notified of an activation." The city advised residents to follow up alarms with a 911 call "for the foreseeable future."

The San Francisco Fire Department noted that while the San Francisco 911 center was still operational, 911 calls had reportedly been impacted for some customers.

Various other official channels, including the X accounts for the City of Little Rock, Arkansas, the Rockville City Police Department of Maryland, and Orlando Police Department in Florida noted similar difficulties. A common recommendation: Use family or friends as proxies for 911 calls or call from a landline.

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Voting machines used in several swing states can be hacked — but any hacking likely will not affect election outcomes: Report

Voting machines used in several swing states can be hacked — but any hacking likely will not affect election outcomes: Report



A recent report from Politico suggests that voting machines currently in use in several swing states can be hacked. However, the author of the piece also insists that any hacking that might occur in future "wouldn't actually corrupt an election’s outcome."

On Friday, Politico published a piece by Eric Geller, a "cybersecurity reporter" who "covers the federal government’s cyber defense activities," according to his bio. In the piece, Geller suggested that voting machines attached to cellular modems could become a "target" for hackers and for those who wish "to sow doubt about vote tallies in the November midterms."

Geller claimed that at least some counties in several swing states — including Florida, Michigan, Iowa, and perhaps Wisconsin — use voting machines with modems for one reason: speed. Geller explained that the public wants results as quickly as possible and that alternative methods of reporting, such as by phone or by vehicle, either are unreliable or cause unnecessary delays.

"There is an appetite in the public for immediate results," said election supervisor Paul Lux of Florida. "And [using modems] is the best way to do that."

Unfortunately, those modems which are great for speed are also vulnerable to cyberattack, Geller alleged, citing other cybersecurity experts who have expressed similar concerns.

"Modem use expands the threat surface area [that] election officials are forced to defend against all hazards including cyber, operational mistake[s], misinformation and fairy tales," said Noah Praetz, who was once election director of Cook County, Illinois.

Dan Wallach, a cybersecurity professor at Rice University, added that such modems can also be exploited by "nation-state hackers" eager to infiltrate America's voting "infrastructure."

Geller also noted that many security teams around the country have taken several steps — including encryption and setting up special networks — to defend voting machine modems from cyberattacks. However, none of their efforts is "foolproof," Geller wrote.

While Geller seems to position his piece as a warning about the security of American elections, some on the political right have speculated that Geller is instead providing a preemptive excuse for Democrats, should Republicans prevail decisively in November.

"This is what Democrats do when they fear a loss," Mike Cernovich wrote on Twitter. "They pre-seed a narrative as an insurance policy. In the event of a big Republican win in the mid-terms, it will once again become socially acceptable to questions election results and make broad and vague claims of voter fraud."

"Totally weird how discussion of election machines is either dangerous, Trump-supporting, election denying, conspiracy theorizing OR standard Democrat messaging … depending on the cycle," tweeted Mollie Hemingway of The Federalist.

Geller claimed that at least some counties in several other states — including Rhode Island, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Minnesota — and the District of Columbia use voting machines attached to modems. Other states — such as Alabama, California, Colorado, Maryland, New York and Virginia — have banned the practice. In 2019, the Senate Intelligence Committee voted to recommend that modems either be disabled or removed from voting machines entirely. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission added a similar recommendation to its list of voluntary guidelines last year.


National Right to Life website taken down by cyberattack



The website for National Right to Life Committee is offline after apparently being targeted for cyberattack.

"We apologize to those of you who have attempted to reach our web page today — we have been under constant cyberattack by those who most likely promote and profit from abortion. The truth will always prevail," National Right to Life tweeted on Monday.

\u201c#Dobbs #CyberAttack\u201d
— National Right to Life (@National Right to Life) 1656370431

The Supreme Court issued a ruling last week that enables states to ban abortions, and leftists have been up in arms about the decision — many liberal lawmakers decried the ruling as a "dark day" for the nation.

On Monday, a Twitter account bearing the name "Lorian Synaro" decried the high court's decision and promised cyberattacks against pro-life organizations.

"The US supreme court decision to overturn #RoeVsWade is dangerous and unacceptable. This decision puts millions of American women at risk. It is the direct result of the rise of reactionary and ultra-conservative forces in all spheres of society," the account declared.

"We must fight once, and for good the reactionary forces and ultra-conservative organizations who aims to control women's bodies and freedom. #Anonymous has always been fighting for women's rights and will be once again fighting those who have declared war on women," the account added in another tweet. "Anti-choice organizations will be attacked daily to ensure they have no safe space on the internet. We want revenge on behalf the millions of women whose life will be impacted by the decision of the supreme court. We want revenge. We want #JanesRevenge!"

\u201cAnti-choice organizations will be attacked daily to ensure they have no safe space on the internet. We want revenge on behalf the millions of women whose life will be impacted by the decision of the supreme court. We want revenge. We want #JanesRevenge!\n\n#OpJane reengaged.\u201d
— Lorian Synaro (@Lorian Synaro) 1656360744

The Lorian Synaro account tweeted about the National Right to Life website going down.

"National Right to Life, one of the largest anti-choice organizations in the US has been taken offline. This is just the beginning. We want Jane's revenge!" a tweet declared on Monday.

The site apparently started working again at some point, but Lorian Synaro tweeted on Tuesday, "It has been taken offline again now."

\u201c@whitenights_ro It has been taken offline again now.\u201d
— Lorian Synaro (@Lorian Synaro) 1656361465

"The National Right to Life organization website is offline since 48+ hours! This is Jane's revenge. We will not stop. To all the anti-choice organizations: Be ready to suffer the consequences of your actions. #Anonymous #OpJane #JanesRevenge #RoeVsWade," the account tweeted on Wednesday.

\u201cThe National Right to Life organization website is offline since 48+ hours! This is Jane's revenge. We will not stop.\n\nTo all the anti-choice organizations: Be ready to suffer the consequences of your actions. #Anonymous #OpJane #JanesRevenge #RoeVsWade\u201d
— Lorian Synaro (@Lorian Synaro) 1656538936

FBI's email servers hacked, cyberattack sends threatening emails to over 100,000 people



The email servers of the Federal Bureau of Investigation were hacked on Friday night. The hackers were able to infiltrate the FBI's email system and send out threatening spam emails to over 100,000 people.

The FBI acknowledged on Saturday that its email servers were hacked, but noted the exploited systems were "taken offline quickly."

"The attackers used legitimate FBI systems to conduct the attack, using email addresses scraped from a database for the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN), among other sources," technology blog Engadget reported. "Over 100,000 addresses received the fake emails in at least two waves."

The email sender was a cybersecurity division of the Department of Homeland Security, and the subject line reads: "Urgent: Threat actor in systems."

The hacker signed off as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Threat Detection and Analysis Group, which hasn't existed for years.

Spamhaus Project — an email spam watchdog group that provides "real-time actionable data on spam, phishing, botnets, and malware sources" — reported on the attack on Saturday.

"We have been made aware of 'scary' emails sent in the last few hours that purport to come from the FBI/DHS. While the emails are indeed being sent from infrastructure that is owned by the FBI/DHS (the LEEP portal), our research shows that these emails *are* fake," the non-profit threat intelligence organization wrote on Twitter. "These fake warning emails are apparently being sent to addresses scraped from ARIN database. They are causing a lot of disruption because the headers are real, they really are coming from FBI infrastructure. They have no name or contact information in the .sig. Please beware!"

These fake warning emails are apparently being sent to addresses scraped from ARIN database. They are causing a lot of disruption because the headers are real, they really are coming from FBI infrastructure. They have no name or contact information in the .sig. Please beware!

— Spamhaus (@spamhaus) 1636795304


For anyone interested, here are the sanitised headers from the sample we got yesterday.pic.twitter.com/KhDluiMSZa

— Spamhaus (@spamhaus) 1636882545

The email reportedly informed recipients that their data was stolen by an "advanced persistent threat actor" named "Vinny Troia," who the email claims to work with the cybercriminal group The Dark Overlord. However, the real-life Vinny Troia is the head of security research of dark web intelligence companies NightLion and Shadowbyte — who believes he was named as the culprit by the hackers in an attempt to discredit him.

Troia told Bleeping Computer, a technology news website, that he believes an internet persona named "pompomourin" is behind the cyberattack.

"My best guess is 'pompomourin' and his band of minions [are behind this incident]," Troia told the outlet of the persona who has attacked him in the past.

"The last time they [pompompurin] hacked the national center for missing children's website blog and put up a post about me being a pedophile," Troia added.

Troia claimed that "pompompurin" contacted him a few hours before the spam email cyberattack and simply said, "Enjoy."

Austin Berglas — head of professional services at cybersecurity company BlueVoyant and a former FBI special agent — told Bloomberg the email system that was hacked was not the one FBI agents use to send classified information.

"This is not the classified system that was compromised," Berglas said. "This is an externally facing account that is used to share and communicate unclassified information."

The FBI and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency released a statement on the hacked email servers.

"The FBI and CISA are aware of the incident this morning involving fake emails from an @ic.fbi.gov email account," the statement read. "This is an ongoing situation and we are not able to provide any additional information at this time. The impacted hardware was taken offline quickly upon discovery of the issue. We continue to encourage the public to be cautious of unknown senders and urge you to report suspicious activity to www.ic3.gov or www.cisa.gov."

THIS is how recent cyber attacks could further the GREAT RESET

THIS is how recent cyber attacks could further the GREAT RESET

World's largest meatpacker hit by cyberattack, shuts down all firm's US beef plants



The world's largest meatpacker, JBS SA, was reportedly hit by a cyberattack over the weekend, forcing the firm to halt production in all its U.S. beef plants and sparking fears of meat shortages in multiple countries.

What are the details?

Bloomberg reported that the Brazilian company has not yet released details itself, but that an official with the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union said JBS has shut down its beef processing facilities in America following a ransomware attack.

Fox News reported that the shutdowns impacted all nine JBS beef plants in the U.S., with locations in Arizona, Texas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wisconsin, Utah, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

JBS did confirm that it suspended its North American and Australian computer systems following the Sunday attack, but remains mum on how operational its plants are globally. The Wall Street Journal reported that JBS produces one quarter of the United States' beef and one-fifth of the country's pork. The company's pork plants in the U.S. appear to remain operational.

The Daily Mail noted that "JBS sells meat under 52 different brand names in the US, including Certified Angus Beef, 5 Star Reserve, Blue Ribbon Angus Beef and Pilgrim's."

According to Bloomberg, "The prospect of more extensive shutdowns worldwide is already upending agricultural markets and raising concerns about food security as hackers increasingly target critical infrastructure. Livestock futures slumped, while pork prices rose."

White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday that the Biden administration "has offered assistance to JBS" following the attack, and disclosed during a media briefing that JBS told the White House that they received a ransom demand from a criminal organization "likely based in Russia," CNN reported.

What else?

The attack comes off the heels of a cyberattack on the U.S. Colonial Pipeline Co. last month, which forced the company that supplies nearly half the fuel to the Eastern Seaboard to shut down and purportedly pay millions in ransom to a Russian criminal group to regain operations.

The attack on Colonial sparked fears of shortages and caused a run on gas stations in the southeastern U.S., driving up prices regionally and pushing the national price of gasoline upwards of $3.00 per gallon. The Daily Caller pointed out that at least four governors declared states of emergency during the ordeal.

Colonial Pipeline reportedly paid hackers nearly $5 million in ransom after cyberattack



After a debilitating and embarrassing cyberattack that crippled the supply chain for days, the Colonial Pipeline Co. buckled to the demands of hackers and paid nearly $5 million in ransom, Bloomberg reported Thursday afternoon.

NBC and CNBC confirmed the report by speaking to a source familiar with the situation and an anonymous U.S. official. Nicole Perlroth, cybersecurity reporter for the New York Times, reported Colonial paid the hackers 75 bitcoin on Monday.

"The company paid the hefty ransom in difficult-to-trace cryptocurrency within hours after the attack, underscoring the immense pressure faced by the Georgia-based operator to get gasoline and jet fuel flowing again to major cities along the Eastern Seaboard, those people said," according to Bloomberg. "A third person familiar with the situation said U.S. government officials are aware that Colonial made the payment."

Once the ransom was paid, the hackers provided Colonial Pipeline with a "decrypting tool to restore its disabled computer network," but the "tool was so slow that the company continued using its own backups to help restore the system," one of the people familiar with the company's efforts told Bloomberg.

A representative from the Colonial Pipeline Co. declined to comment on the ransom, but told Bloomberg that the company began to resume fuel shipments around 5 p.m. ET Wednesday.

"Colonial Pipeline has made substantial progress in safely restarting our pipeline system and can report that product delivery has commenced in a majority of the markets we service," Colonial's website said in a Thursday update. "By mid-day today, we project that each market we service will be receiving product from our system."

Thursday's update that Colonial Pipeline paid the hefty ransom contradicts earlier reports that said the energy company had no intention of paying the ransom.

During a Thursday news conference, President Joe Biden was asked if he knew that Colonial paid the hackers a ransom, and he responded by saying, "No comment."

Joe Biden smirks and says "no comment" on if Colonial paid hackers ransom for the pipeline attack https://t.co/a7BCC3X15k

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) 1620925211.0

Colonial became aware of the cyberattack around May 7 and immediately shut down its operations. The paralyzing cyberattack on the nation's largest pipeline triggered a full-scale shutdown, which led to fuel shortages, panic buying, and several governors declaring a state of emergency. The 5,500-mile pipeline runs from Houston to Linden, New Jersey, and supplies about 45% of the fuel used along the Eastern Seaboard.

By Wednesday, the pipeline shutdown helped push the national average price of gasoline to $3.008 per gallon, according to the Automobile Association of America.

Earlier this week, the FBI named a criminal gang of hackers named "DarkSide" as the culprits of the devastating cyberattack. DarkSide, which specializes in digital extortion, is suspected of operating out of Eastern Europe or Russia. President Biden said the hacker group is likely based in Russia, but does not believe the Russian government is involved.

"We do not believe the Russian government was involved in this attack, but we do have strong reason to believe that the criminals who did the attack are living in Russia, that's where it came from," Biden said Thursday.

The DarkSide group described its actions as "apolitical" in a statement provided to CNBC.

"We are apolitical, we do not participate in geopolitics, do not need to tie us with a defined government and look for our motives," the group stated. "Our goal is to make money, and not creating problems for society. From today we introduce moderation and check each company that our partners want to encrypt to avoid social consequences in the future."

The FBI discourages organizations from paying a ransom in a ransomware attack because "paying a ransom doesn't guarantee you or your organization will get any data back," and it "also encourages perpetrators to target more victims and offers an incentive for others to get involved in this type of illegal activity."

Anne Neuberger, the White House's top cybersecurity official, would not say if companies should pony up ransom demands.

"Typically that's a private sector decision," Anne Neuberger, deputy national security advisor for cyber and emerging technologies, told reporters at the White House on Monday. "We recognize that victims of cyberattacks often face a very difficult situation and they have to just balance often the cost-benefit when they have no choice with regards to paying a ransom. Colonial is a private company and we'll defer information regarding their decision on paying a ransom to them."

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