Skyline International Reveals UAE’s Cybercrimes

Stockholm, December 10, 2018

Skyline International revealed that the United Arab Emirates has recruited international hackers to penetrate regional and international institutions and websites, activists and journalists accounts.

In a detailed report, the Stockholm-based International Foundation noted that the UAE, through its government-funded firm DarkMatter, is offering bids for cyber-hackers and under the title “Cyber Security” with a pretext of combating piracy and Harmful cyber-attacks, in addition to providing rules to secure communications.

The report reveals that the company is hiring experts outside the UAE to carry out major espionage operations on its citizens mainly, and then attempt to penetrate the accounts and the websites of activists, estimated at 400 employees.

Skyline International’s sources will remain confidential in order to protect it from any consequences and prosecution that may be provided by the UAE.

Bringing experts from international companies

According to the International Foundation, close cooperation is taking place between DarkMatter and US pirates for international cyber targets, such as hitting certain targets or building global spy systems to track some people or businesses

The report said there were offices of the UAE company in China, Canada, Finland and Belarus.

The company identifies itself as a cybersecurity organization around the world, providing protection to users by providing information services and organizing them, as well as monitoring techniques.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=9&v=7jn7NWbMI10

The UAE-run company, Faisal Al-Bannai, has recently attracted a large number of talents from international companies such as McAfee, which operates in computer protection systems from viruses, the South Korean giant Samsung, the popular Google search engine and the American Wickr that uses a special system to encrypt messages.

According to information obtained by Skyline International, instead of providing services and fixing defects in companies or organizations that seek help from Dark Mater to eliminate the electronic defects and gaps that may allow hackers to exploit them, the UAE company is doing the opposite. It sets up spying software instead of strengthening defences against all forms of penetration, which allows it to penetrate all surveillance cameras, computers and wireless communications, which actually happened in neighbouring countries to penetrate officials phones and websites.

 

Direct relation with the UAE government

The company’s employees are not fully aware of what is happening, while its officials are involved. They are recruiting pirates around the world and interviewing them at the company’s headquarters in Abu Dhabi.

Despite the ongoing denial by DarkMatter of any links with the UAE government, it knows itself through its news that it is a strategic cooperation company with the government. Skyline International also revealed that the company’s office is located in a building in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, National Security Center of the UAE intelligence on the 15th floor near Aldar roundabout.

The UAE’s extensive attempts to recruit hackers did not stop. Instead, the company tried to reach out to a large number of e-security researchers, some of them from Uper Motors, which provide services around the world by communicating with employees in various security areas via LinkedIn.

Skyline International revealed that the fictional salaries offered to hackers and security researchers were enough to attract them. It is reaching more than half a million dollars a year. The main goal was to recruit at least 250 hackers.

The real danger lies in DarkMatter’s attempts to gain access to the world and spread trust among major companies such as Microsoft, Facebook and Mozilla.  It is internationally reliable because of its use of electronic standards such as a clear electronic signature. The UAE company is not like that. Software as updates to some of the global programs, which in fact are only penetration programs, able to penetrate data for journalists and citizens, social networking sites in Facebook and Twitter, and personal emails.

US-UAE COOPERATION  

Skyline International warned of close cooperation between US authorities and its affiliates with the UAE company, which facilitates its work by accessing the information of these companies that have contracts with the Pentagon and the American company to get American tools for penetration, which the Washington Post reported earlier.

The Swedish Foundation stresses the seriousness of what has been revealed about this UAE company, which strives to collect information worldwide by providing huge resources to serve the spreading of malware, which is clearly aimed at violating the privacy of citizens and to keep them under surveillance and learn the details of their daily lives. This strengthens the desire of other companies to buy this huge information illegally, and contrary to the simplest local and international norms.