The US Agency for Global Media, part of the State Department that provides news and information in countries where the press is restricted, was notified “a couple months ago” by Microsoft that some of its data may have been stolen, a spokesperson said in an emailed statement. No security or personally identifiable sensitive data was compromised, the spokesperson said.

The agency is working closely with the Department of Homeland Security on the incident, the spokesperson said, declining to answer additional questions. A State Department spokesperson said, “We are aware that Microsoft is reaching out to agencies, both affected and unaffected, in the spirit of transparency.”

Microsoft disclosed in January that a Russian hacking group it calls Midnight Blizzard had accessed corporate email accounts and later warned that they were attempting to use secrets shared between the technology giant and its customers. The company has declined to identify the customers who were impacted.

“As our investigation continues, we have been reaching out to customers to notify them if they had corresponded with a Microsoft corporate email account that was accessed,” a Microsoft spokesperson said on Wednesday. “We will continue to coordinate, support and assist our customers in taking mitigating measures.”

In addition, the Department of Veterans Affairs was notified in March that it was impacted the Microsoft breach, officials for the agency said.

A one-second intrusion

The hackers used a single set of stolen credentials — found in the emails they accessed — to break into a test environment in the VA’s Microsoft Cloud account around January, the officials said, adding that the intrusion lasted for one second. Midnight Blizzard likely intended to check if the credentials were valid, presumably with the larger intention of breaching the VA’s network, the officials said. 

The agency changed the exposed credentials, along with log-in details across their Microsoft environments, once they were notified of the intrusion, they said. After reviewing the emails that the hackers accessed, the VA determined that no additional credentials or sensitive email was taken, the officials said.

Terrence Hayes, the VA’s press secretary, said an investigation is continuing to determine any additional impact.

The Peace Corps was also contacted by Microsoft and notified about the Midnight Blizzard breach, according to a statement from its press office. “Based on this notification, Peace Corps technical staff were able to mitigate the vulnerability,” according to the agency. The Peace Corps declined further comment.

Bloomberg News asked other federal agencies for comment, and none of the others disclosed that they were impacted by Midnight Blizzard’s attack on Microsoft. Bloomberg previously reported that more than a dozen Texas state agencies and public universities were exposed by the Russian hack.

Midnight Blizzard, also known in cybersecurity circles as “Cozy Bear” and “APT29,” is part of Russia’s foreign intelligence service, according to US and UK authorities. 

In April, US federal agencies were ordered to analyze emails, reset compromise passwords and work to secure Microsoft cloud accounts amid fears that Midnight Blizzard may have accessed correspondence. Microsoft has been notifying some customers in the months since then that their emails with the tech giant were accessed by the Russian hackers.

The Midnight Blizzard breach was one in a series of high-profile and damaging security failures at the Redmond, Washington-based technology company, which has drawn strong condemnation by the US government. Microsoft President Brad Smith appeared before Congress last month where he acknowledged security failures and vowed to improve the company’s operations. 

By Maya Gebeily

Qlayaa, LEBANON (Reuters) – The last time Lebanese farmer Zakaria Farah stepped onto his fields outside the southern town of Qlayaa was in January – but it was not to plant. With shelling in the distance, he swiftly dug his hands into the soil to gather samples that could determine his family’s farming future.

After bagging up the earth, Farah, 30, sent half-a-dozen samples to a laboratory at the American University of Beirut (AUB) to be tested for residues of white phosphorus from Israeli shelling, hoping he’d learn whether he can plant his fields once hostilities end.

“I want to know what I’m feeding my son, what I’m feeding my wife, what I’m eating,” he told Reuters in June. “We’re afraid for the future of our land. What can we eat? What can we drink?”

Farah told Reuters he fears his fields have been poisoned by the Israeli military’s use of white phosphorus since October, when exchanges of fire erupted between Israel and Lebanese armed group Hezbollah in parallel with the Gaza war. He said there are dozens of farmers in south Lebanon as worried as he is.

According to the Lebanese National Council for Scientific Research, there have been 175 Israeli attacks on south Lebanon using white phosphorus since then, many of them sparking fires that have affected over 600 hectares (1,480 acres) of farmland. 

White phosphorus munitions are not banned as a chemical weapon and can be used in war to make smoke screens, mark targets or burn buildings – but since they can cause serious burns and start fires, international conventions prohibit their use against military targets located among civilians. 

Lebanon is a party to those international protocols, while Israel is not.  

In June, Human Rights Watch said it had verified the use of white phosphorus in at least 17 municipalities in southern Lebanon since October, including five “where airburst munitions were unlawfully used over populated residential areas.”

In response to questions from Reuters, the Israeli military said the “primary smoke shells” it used do not contain white phosphorus. It said smoke shells that do include white phosphorus can be used to create smokescreens, and that it “uses only lawful means of warfare.” 

According to a December report on Lebanon by the U.N. Development Programme, white phosphorus is extremely poisonous and poses “ongoing and unpredictable hazards due to its prolonged and difficult-to-control burning, creating serious risks to human health, safety, and the environment.” 

The agency said that soil quality in the conflict area of southern Lebanon had been affected by the spread of heavy metals and toxic compounds, with “white phosphorus usage further reducing fertility and increasing soil acidity.”

SOIL SCIENCE

Farah and other farmers estimate they have already lost up to $7,000 each in potential income, as continuing bombardment has made it too risky for them to plant or harvest the usual seasons of wheat, tobacco, lentils and other greens. 

Oday Abou Sari, a farmer from the southern town of Dhayra, said white phosphorus had also burned hay he had gathered for livestock and even plastic irrigation pipes across his fields. 

“I have to start all over – but first, I need to know if it’s safe for planting,” said Abou Sari. 

To find out if the white phosphorus has left a lasting impact on their soil, farmers are digging in – literally – and sending samples to Dr. Rami Zurayk, a soil chemist at AUB.

Zurayk developed a research protocol to collect and examine the samples. First, soil is gathered at various distances from the impact site, including a control sample from 500 meters away – which would not have been directly affected by the strike. 

Once in his lab, the soil is sifted, mixed with acid and exposed to high heat and pressure. A solution is added to show the concentration of phosphorus, with the intensity of colour in the result matching the concentration of the phosphorus. The sample is then compared to the control, which sets the benchmark of naturally-occurring phosphorus in the soil. 

“What we’re looking for is what happens to the soils and to the plants in locations that have received white phosphorus bombing. Does the phosphorus remain? In what concentrations? Does it disappear?” Zurayk told Reuters. 

His assistant, doctoral student Leen Dirani, told Reuters she had thus far tested samples from four towns this way – but they need more samples to “obtain a conclusive outcome.”  

But the steady pace of Israeli shelling on southern Lebanon – particularly agricultural fields that Hezbollah fighters are accused of using as cover – has made farmers unwilling to venture out to gather more samples. Some, like Abou Sari, have left Lebanon altogether. He is waiting out the war abroad and so for now is unable to obtain soil samples.

Others are documenting through video footage. Green Southerners, a collective of ecologists and nature lovers in Lebanon’s south, have filmed several incidents of shelling showing the tell-tale signs of white phosphorous attacks: dozens of streams of white bursting out of a munition over farmlands.

The group’s chairman Hisham Younes told Reuters the attacks’ “frightening density” amounts to ecocide – mass destruction of a natural environment by humans, deliberately or by negligence.

Given the possible impacts on soil, water reserves and even ancient trees, “we are talking about a profound injury to the natural system. The repercussions are multiplied,” Younes said.

Lebanon’s ministries of environment and agriculture are working with UNDP to determine the extent of those repercussions, and hope to use any documentation or lab results to stand up complaints to the United Nations.

“This is an act of ecocide, and we’ll take it to the U.N. Security Council,” Lebanese environment minister Nasser Yassin told Reuters. 

In response to questions from Reuters, the Israeli military said the accusation of ecocide was “completely baseless.”