this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2025
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Forescout's phony water plant fooled TwoNet into claiming a fake cyber victory – then it quietly shut up shop

Security researchers say they duped pro-Russia cybercriminals into targeting a fake critical infrastructure organization, which the crew later claimed - via their Telegram group - to be a real-world attack.

Forescout said the short-lived TwoNet hacktivist group fell for one of its researchers' honeypots, designed to look like a water treatment plant to a remote attacker. [...]

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[–] Chozo@fedia.io 123 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I'm sorry, what sort of "hacktivist" group targets water treatment plants? That's not hactivism, that's terrorism.

[–] real_squids@sopuli.xyz 64 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

A pro-russian one apparently. Makes sense as their definition of terrorism is, conveniently, very flexible.

Before the group scarpered again, it pitched itself as a full-service cybercrime crew, instead of the almost exclusively DDoS-focused outfit from earlier in the year.

Yeah I wouldn't call someone like that hacktivists if they're selling their services to whoever.

[–] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 13 points 3 days ago

Its a Russian government hacking group, for them there is no distinction

[–] dick_fineman@discuss.online 65 points 3 days ago (4 children)

I feel like this is the plot to a Hallmark movie. He was a Russian Hacktivist group, She was a researcher setting up honeypots to trap her enemies. But what she never expected was to trap love in her honeypot.

...and now maybe it's the plot for a shitty porno. Anyway, Netflix, give me money.

[–] blave@lemmy.world 18 points 3 days ago

When Gen Z becomes the target demographic for the hallmark movies, you can bet there’ll be a dozen of these a month.

[–] TimeNaan@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

He was a russian hacktivist,

She was a researcher,

Can I make it any more obvious?

[–] Doubleohdonut@lemmy.ca 1 points 3 days ago

... Jerry Orbach's eyes....

[–] adespoton@lemmy.ca 30 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

I wonder whether they shut up shop because they thought they’d just made the CIA’s “naughty” list?

Or just did the rather common thing these days of ditching their infrastructure as blown and starting up again under a new name?

[–] scytale@piefed.zip 21 points 3 days ago

Probably more of the latter. They unwittingly fell into a honeypot and are probably afraid they exposed themselves and will be tracked down. So better to break it up and try again in another form.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 6 points 3 days ago

It could be that failure is punished very severely

It isn't all that uncommon in Authoritarian government