Want to Rent an Internet Address at the White House?

The White House network has been found to be accessible for renting internet addresses, according to security experts. Several staffers at the White House are utilizing computers or mobile devices with residential proxy services, making their internet addresses available for others to lease. One of the proxy services is linked to a Russian company, whose founder's web hosting business was implicated in cyberattacks against election systems in Arizona and Illinois in 2016.

The security firm Layer3 Intel detected multiple residential proxy nodes emanating from the internet address network designated for the Executive Office of the President (AS2650). This activity persisted from October 5 to November 3, with the proxies originating from the White House network 236 times during this period. A proxy tracking company, Synthient, reported seeing the activity associated with multiple Windows 11 installations of a service named Infatica, which is frequently integrated into free mobile and desktop applications.

Vladimir Fomenko, the founder of Infatica, is a Russian individual whose hosting firm, King Servers, was responsible for six of the eight internet addresses used by Russia's state security services to infiltrate databases of election systems in Arizona and Illinois in 2016. Layer3 Intel discovered that the proxy exit nodes at the White House originated from six internet addresses, and approximately 26 out of 30 days saw this activity, mostly occurring between 5 p.m. and midnight.

It is noteworthy that Infatica was not the sole proxy service utilizing White House internet addresses; Layer3 Intel uncovered 28 separate residential proxy services able to exit through this network. This situation represents public access, and anyone can obtain it by signing up with a public residential proxy service, paying a few dollars, and sending requests through it.