Google’s threat team confirms Iran targeting Trump, Biden, and Harris campaigns

Enlarge / Roger Stone, former adviser to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, center, during the Republican National Convention (RNC) in Milwaukee on July 17, 2024. (credit: Getty Images)

Google’s Threat Analysis Group confirmed Wednesday that they observed a threat actor backed by the Iranian government targeting Google accounts associated with US presidential campaigns, in addition to stepped-up attacks on Israeli targets.

APT42, associated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, “consistently targets high-profile users in Israel and the US,” the Threat Analysis Group (TAG) writes. The Iranian group uses hosted malware, phishing pages, malicious redirects, and other tactics to gain access to Google, Dropbox, OneDrive, and other cloud-based accounts. Google’s TAG writes that it reset accounts, sent warnings to users, and blacklisted domains associated with APT42’s phishing attempts.

Among APT42’s tools were Google Sites pages that appeared to be a petition from legitimate Jewish activists, calling on Israel to mediate its ongoing conflict with Hamas. The page was fashioned from image files, not HTML, and an ngrok redirect sent users to phishing pages when they moved to sign the petition.