Good morning! News of yet another authority hacked emerges nearly every hour. Economy Minister Paulo Guedes has a plan for the economy. The fight for oil money. And more.
Everybody who’s anybody is getting hacked
Law enforcement agents say that the list of authorities who had their cell phones hacked could reach 1,000 individuals. The biggest names in the republic were affected, including President Jair Bolsonaro, Supreme Court justices, the heads of both congressional houses, the prosecutor general, and Economy Minister Paulo Guedes.
Why it matters. The matter began when website The Intercept began leaking private messages exchanged by members of Operation Car Wash (more below). Many theories arose as to the origin of the conversations, including that Russian intelligence was behind it. The story now goes (according to police anyway) that the information was the product of four people who used to run a credit card fraud operation—they were arrested on Tuesday. The fact that almost every single A-list politician in Brazil got hacked leads one to speculate as to how vulnerable the country might be should a foreign power decide to carry out a cyber attack.
No to security. Upon taking office, President Bolsonaro was given an encrypted...