Awesome! (with a caveat below)
Shadow Brokers Response Team is creating open & transparent crowd-funded analysis of leaked NSA tools.
The group calling itself the Shadow Brokers have released several caches of exploits to date. These caches and releases have had a detrimental outcome on the Internet at large, one leak especially resulted in the now in-famous WannaCry ransomware worm – others have been used by criminal crackers to illegally access infrastructure. Many have been analysing the data to determine its authenticity and impact on infrastructure, as a community it has been expressed that the harm caused by exploits could have been mitigated against had the Shadow Brokers been paid for their disclosures.
The leaks of information seen so far have included weaponized reliable exploits for the following platforms:
- Cisco
- Juniper
- Solaris
- Microsoft Windows
- Linux
The Shadow Brokers have announced they are offering a “monthly dump” service which requires a subscription of 100 ZCASH coins. Currently this is around £17688.29 but could change due to the fleeting nature of cryptocurrency. By paying the Shadow Brokers the cash they asked for we hope to pool resources and avert any future WannaCry type incidents. This patreon is a chance for those who may not have large budgets (SME, startups and individuals) in the ethical hacking and whitehat community to pool resources and buy a subscription for the new monthly released data.
The goal here is to raise sufficient funds from interested parties to purchase a subscription to the new data leak. We are attempting to perform the following task:
- Raise funds to purchase 100 ZCASH coins
- Purchase 100 ZCASH coins from a reputable exchange
- Transfer 100 ZCASH coins to ShadowBrokers with email address
- Access the data from the ShadowBrokers and distribute to backers
- Perform analysis on data leak and ascertain risk / perform disclosures
The Shadow Brokers have implied that the leak could be any of the following items of interest:
- web browser, router, handset exploits and tools
- newer material from NSA ops disk including Windows 10 exploits
- misc compromised network data (SWIFT or Nuclear programmes)
… (emphasis in original)
An almost excellent plan that with enough contributors, reduces the risk to any one person to a manageable level.
Two-hundred and fifty contributors at $100 each, makes the $25,000 goal. That’s quite doable.
My only caveat is the “…whitehat ethical hacker…” language for sharing the release. Buying a share in the release should be just that, buying a share. What participants do or don’t do with their share is not a concern.
Kroger clerks don’t ask me if I am going to use flour to bake bread for the police and/or terrorists.
Besides, the alleged NSA tools weren’t created by “…whitehat ethical hackers….” Yes? No government has a claim on others to save them from their own folly.
Any competing crowd-funded subscriptions to the Shadow Brokers release?