Quote:The U.S. government has identified Russia as the “likely” culprit behind the widespread SolarWinds cyberattack that has so far affected multiple federal agencies and private-sector companies. Cyberespionage is cited as the motivation behind the attack, which the feds characterized as ongoing.
 
In a rare joint statement by the FBI, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the National Security Agency (NSA), the agencies said a task force assigned to investigate the incident has found indications that Russia was behind the attack, something many government officials and security experts had already suspected.
 
“This work indicates that an advanced persistent threat (APT) actor, likely Russian in origin, is responsible for most or all of the recently discovered, ongoing cyber compromises of both government and non-governmental networks,” according to the statement, which did not provide the technical details behind the attribution. “At this time, we believe this was, and continues to be, an intelligence-gathering effort.”

The Departments of Homeland Security, Defense, Treasury and Commerce, the Pentagon, the National Institute of Health and others are known to have been attacked, along with Microsoft.