Green Berets storm building after compromising its Wi-Fi

US Army Special Forces, aka the Green Berets, have been demonstrating their ability to use offensive cyber-security tools in the recent Swift Response 24 military exercises in May, the military has now confirmed.

The elite org, one of whose remits is unconventional warfare, includes Operational Detachment Alpha (ODA) units of highly trained, mature soldiers with intensively honed skills. These now include compromising wireless networks, as the military demonstrated with a target building near Skillingaryd in Sweden stormed by members of the 10th Special Forces Group.

"What this allows us to do is target an objective, use the signaling equipment to gain access to any Wi-Fi networks originating at the target, and then monitor activity from that location for a period of time," an identity-protected ODA team member explained.

“It’s a very useful tool for us, because it gives us another set of eyes and helps to paint a clearer picture of our objective.”

The building in question was scanned using an unnamed remote access device (RAD) to identify the Wi-Fi networks running its security systems from what looks like an undercover van. After cracking the password, the team moved around the network, shutting off CCTV cameras, opening secured doors, and disabling other security systems.

In the second phase of the attack, another team parachuted in seven miles from the target, reconnoitered the area, entered the now unsecured building, and left "signal jamming equipment to clear any trace of the attack." Judging from the released photos, they also left a laptop behind playing Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up; just because you're an elite trooper doesn't mean you can't have a sense of humor.

“In a real-world situation, this would allow us to gain information in a way that we haven’t always had,” explained the commander of the digital ODA team. “If we have a specific target or objective we need to reach, we now have the capability to glean critical information in a way that is undetectable if we do our jobs right."

While the war in Ukraine has shown the much-expanded use of drones in the field, much of the hacking operations have been carried out behind the lines. At last year's Black Hat conference, CISA director Jen Easterly detailed how Russia's attempt to cripple Ukraine electronically had largely failed, thanks to help from the US and others, but this is one of the first times we've seen front-line cyber-attacks.

Swift Response 24 is part of a larger NATO training session designed to demonstrate how the alliance will work together in the event of an attack on a member state, and it's the first time that new members of the defensive alliance - Finland and Sweden - have taken part in operations.

It's one of the largest such drills in years, using more than 17,000 US and 23,000 multinational service members, and sends a pretty clear signal to countries such as Russia that NATO stands ready in case of an attack. ®