What is Red October mystery?

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Picture used for representational purpose only — SXC.HU

Russian researchers recently unearthed a major cyber attack that had been stealing confidential documents since 2007. Kaspersky Labs that released a report on “Red October”, the malware that was used to infest various government systems across Europe and highly secured institutions such as the embassies, nuclear research centers, oil and gas institutes.

It was designed to steal encrypted files and was even able to recover files that were deleted from the system. The name Red October aka Rocra took its name from the month in which it was first discovered and the titular silent Russian submarine that was a work of fiction by author Tom Clancy.
Kaspersky went on to describe Red October as a “framework” which could be quickly upgraded to take advantage of its victims’ weaknesses. The attackers began their assault with spam emails and infected documents that were suited to appeal to their targests. Once affected, the intruders would gather information on the system before installing certain modules to trigger the infusion. Cyber experts said that Rocra was more personal and finely tuned for victims. Akash Bakshi, a cyber expert says, “Basically, the fact that they targeted a limited audience made it difficult for anyone to detect this sort of an attack.”