Russia 'likely' behind SolarWinds hack: US intelligence

U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies said on Jan. 5 that Russia was probably behind the massive SolarWinds hack that has shaken government and corporate security, contradicting President Donald Trump, who had suggested China could be to blame.

A joint statement by the FBI, Directorate of National Intelligence, the National Security Agency and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency outlined their findings in what experts have called the most devastating break in U.S. computer security in years.

Their investigation "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," they said.

Trump, who over four years has steadfastly avoided criticizing Moscow, has refused to finger Russia in the hacking case.

"Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens," he tweeted about the hack in December, adding that the media were, "for mostly financial reasons, petrified of discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!)."

Both Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-Attorney General Bill Barr have also previously pointed to Moscow as the culprits.

According to CISA, the hack is focused on the Orion security software produced by the U.S. firm SolarWinds, widely found in government and private sector computers across the globe.

Some 18,000 public and private customers of SolarWinds would be vulnerable to the hack, the statement said.

But it said that out of that number, "a much smaller number have been compromised by follow-on activity on their systems."

So far investigators have found less than 10 U.S....