With the growing cybersecurity threats, Microsoft took over six internet domains acting on a court order, and introduced AccountGuard for emails. Microsoft AccountGuard is a move extending their Defending Democracy Program which will be applicable to both organizational and personal email accounts.
Microsoft’s Digital Crimes Unit (DCU) executed a court order to take over six internet domains created by a group known as Strontium, or alternatively Fancy Bear or APT28. The group is widely associated with the Russian government. The six internet domains, my-iri.org, hudsonorg-my-sharepoint.com, senate.group, adfs-senate.services, adfs-senate.email, office365-onedrive.com impersonated the real websites. Of late, there have been instances of foreign entities launching cyber strikes to disrupt elections.
Microsoft AccountGuard will provide “state-of-the-art cybersecurity protection” without any additional cost. This applies to individuals, campaigns and related political institutions. Brad Smith, President at Microsoft stated: “To be clear, we currently have no evidence these domains were used in any successful attacks before the DCU transferred control of them, nor do we have evidence to indicate the identity of the ultimate targets of any planned attack involving these domains.”
The technology is free of charge to candidates, campaigns and related political institutions using Office 365.
Microsoft AccountGuard will provide these features:
The Defending Democracy Program is a global effort as Microsoft tries to scale its efforts and reach other democratic countries to protect their processes in the coming years. Microsoft has identified 2018 as a critical year for governments and tech companies to work together towards making elections more secure. The Defending Democracy Program consist of some steps that include:
Microsoft will focus on the U.S. midterm elections of November 2018. They are piloting new cross-industry protections; this will also be done in the 2020 U.S. presidential elections.
Tom Burt, Corporate Vice President, Customer Security & Trust stated: “Expect to hear more from us on what we’re doing, both on our own and in partnership with governments and our industry colleagues, to put our cybersecurity expertise to work for the defense of democracy.”
Visit the Microsoft Blog for more details on AccountGuard and the defending democracy program.
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