Russian government hackers involved in a series of government and private network breaches have been able to infiltrate Microsoft systems.
AAs far as it became known, they gained access to a valuable source code, the technology giant said on Thursday.
The company had earlier admitted that it had mistakenly downloaded a software patch, which was used by Russian cyber-spies as a possible "backdoor" to victims' systems, but it was not known if hackers had seen the company's source code.
Microsoft, however, did not specify the type of source code that was accessed. The attacker breached an employee account through which he saw the password, the company said.
«We detected unusual activity with a small number of internal accounts and while checking, we found that one account was used to view source code in some source code repositories", The company stated in a post. Microsoft revealed two weeks ago that it had found malware on its system, a reference to a software patch from SolarWinds that the Russians had used to gain access.
According to the Washington Post, U.S. government officials have said that simply downloading a software update is not a violation, but there is no doubt that it is gaining access to the source code.
This incident places Microsoft, one of the largest cloud and software companies in the world, among the victims not only of hacking, but also of one of the cases of cyber espionage in recent years.
The hackers had no rights to modify the code or the engineering systems, Microsoft said, adding that "our investigation further confirmed that no changes were made. These accounts have been investigated and restored. "
The Redmond-based company said it had not found access to production services or customer data. She said her research also found no evidence that her systems had been used to attack others.
However, some of its cloud customers have been hacked by a third party that manages the company's cloud access services, the Washington Post reported last week.
Microsoft said it was the first to notify several U.S. government agencies in recent weeks that they had been violated.
Although the company emphasizes that the intrusion does not endanger the security of its services or customer data, some experts say that access to the source code - even if it is only for publicity purposes - could potentially allow hackers to they do malicious actions.
Microsoft and the US government are continuing to investigate the breaches, a process that is likely to take months.
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