Wikileaks: iphones, ipads and smart TVs used as spy devices

WikiLeaks has published thousands of documents described as secret files about CIA hacking tools the US government employs to break into users' computers, mobile phones and even smart TVs.

wikileaks claim secret services can hack into computers, ipads, even smart TVs (AP Photo/Patrick Sison, File)


The documents describe CIA efforts - co-operating with friendly foreign governments including the UK - to subvert the world’s most popular technology platforms, including Apple’s iPhones and iPads, Google’s Android phones and the Microsoft Windows operating system for desktop computers and laptops.

Sign up to our Politics newsletter

Sign up to our Politics newsletter


WikiLeaks claimed Samsung smart TVs are among the CIA’s weapons for surveillance, adding that the agency worked with UK intelligence officials to turn microphones in TVs into listening devices.

Samsung smart TVs have microphones so viewers can make voice commands, such as requests for movie recommendations.

The commands typically are not transmitted outside the home unless users activate the feature.

If the TV is off, there is no listening being done.

But WikiLeaks claims that documents it obtained show that through a programme called Weeping Angel, the target TV appears to be off when it is actually on - and listening.

WikiLeaks says the audio goes to a covert CIA server rather than a party authorised by Samsung.

In such cases, audio is not limited to TV commands but could include everyday conversations.

Another document discusses hacking vehicle systems, indicating the CIA’s interest in hacking modern cars with sophisticated on-board computers.


Jonathan Liu, a spokesman for the CIA, said: “We do not comment on the authenticity or content of purported intelligence documents.”

White House spokesman Sean Spicer also declined to comment.

Missing from WikiLeaks’ trove are the actual hacking tools themselves, some of which were developed by government hackers while others were purchased from outsiders.

WikiLeaks said it planned to avoid distributing tools “until a consensus emerges” on the political nature of the CIA’s programme and how such software could be analysed, disarmed and published.

Tuesday’s disclosure left anxious consumers who use the products with little recourse, since repairing the software vulnerabilities in ways that might block the tools’ effectiveness is the responsibility of leading technology companies.

The revelations threatened to upend confidence in an Obama-era government programme, the Vulnerability Equities Process, under which federal agencies warn technology companies about weaknesses in their software so they can be quickly fixed.


WikiLeaks said the material came from “an isolated, high-security network” inside the CIA’s Centre for Cyber Intelligence but did not say whether the files were removed by a rogue employee or whether the theft involved hacking a federal contractor working for the CIA or perhaps breaking into a staging server where such information might have been temporarily stored.

“The archive appears to have been circulated among former US government hackers and contractors in an unauthorised manner, one of whom has provided WikiLeaks with portions of the archive,” WikiLeaks said in a statement.

The tools described in the documents carried bizarre names, including Time Stomper, Fight Club, Jukebox, Bartender, Wild Turkey, Margarita and RickyBobby, a racecar-driving character in the comedy film Talladega Nights.

The RickyBobby tool, the documents said, was intended to plant and harvest files on computers running “newer versions of Microsoft Windows and Windows Server”.

It operated “as a lightweight implant for target computers” without raising warnings from antivirus or intrusion-detection software.


The files include comments by CIA hackers boasting in slang language of their prowess: “You know we got the dankest Trojans and collection tools,” one reads.

The documents show broad exchanges of tools and information among the CIA, NSA and other US intelligence agencies, as well as intelligence services of close allies Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

WikiLeaks claimed the CIA used both its Langley, Virginia, headquarters and the US consulate in Frankfurt, Germany, as bases for its covert hackers.


The AP found that one purported CIA hack that imitates the Domain Name System - the internet’s phone book - traced to an internet domain hosted in Germany.

Jake Williams, a security expert with Augusta, Georgia-based Rendition Infosec who has experience dealing with government hackers, said the files’ extensive references to operation security meant they were almost certainly government-backed.



Among them, it said it had withheld details of tens of thousands of “CIA targets and attack machines throughout Latin America, Europe and the United States”.

WikiLeaks also said its data included a “substantial library” of digital espionage techniques borrowed from other countries, including Russia.

If the authenticity of the documents is officially confirmed, it would represent yet another catastrophic breach for the US intelligence community at the hands of WikiLeaks and its allies, which have repeatedly humbled Washington with the mass release of classified material, including from the State Department and the Pentagon.

Tuesday’s documents purported to be from the CIA’s “Embedded Development Branch” discuss techniques for injecting malicious code into computers protected by the personal security products of leading international anti-virus companies.



Under a list of references in one exchange, users were told: “Be advised, the following may be low traffic sites, sites in which it might be a good idea to disable JavaScript, etc,” referring to a widely used internet programming language.

“Remember, practise safe browsing, kidz!” they were told.

Some documents were classified “secret” or “top secret” and not for distribution to foreign nationals.

One file said those classifications would protect deployed hacks from being “attributed” to the US government.
