WASHINGTON: The hackers who carried out the massive SolarWinds intrusion were in the software company’s system as early as January 2019, months earlier than previously known, the company’s top official said Wednesday.
SolarWinds had previously traced the origins of the hack to the fall of 2019 but now believes that hackers were doing “very early recon activities” as far back as the prior January, according to Sudhakar Ramakrishna, the company’s president and CEO.
“The tradecraft that the attackers used was extremely well done and extremely sophisticated, where they did everything possible to hide in plain sight, so to speak,” Ramakrishna said during a discussion hosted by the RSA Conference.
The SolarWinds hack, which was first reported last December and which US officials have linked to the Russian government, is one in a series of major breaches that has prompted a major cybersecurity focus from the Biden administration. By seeding the company’s widely used software update with malicious code, hackers were able to penetrate the networks of multiple US government agencies and private sector corporations in an apparent act of cyberespionage. The US imposed sanctions against Russia last month.
Also Wednesday, Ramakrishna apologized for the way the company blamed an intern earlier this year during congressional testimony for poor password security protocols. That public statement, he said, was “not appropriate.”
“I have long held a belief system and an attitude that you never flog failure. You want your employees, including interns, to make mistakes and learn from those mistakes and together we become better,” he added. “Obviously you don’t want to make the same mistake over and over again. You want to improve.”
Hackers targeted SolarWinds earlier than previously known
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Hackers targeted SolarWinds earlier than previously known

- By seeding the company’s widely used software update with malicious code, hackers were able to penetrate the networks of multiple US government agencies and private sector corporations in an apparent act of cyberespionage
Wildfire destroys a historic Grand Canyon lodge and other structures

The Grand Canyon Lodge, the only lodging inside the park at the North Rim, was consumed by the flames, park Superintendent Ed Keable told park residents, staff and others in a meeting Sunday morning. He said the visitor center, the gas station, a waste water treatment plant, an administrative building and some employee housing were among the 50 to 80 structures lost. “Numerous” historic cabins in the area also were destroyed, the park said.
Two wildfires are burning at or near the North Rim, known as the White Sage Fire and the Dragon Bravo Fire. The latter is the one that impacted the lodge and other structures.
Started by lightning on July 4, the Dragon Bravo Fire was initially managed by authorities with a “confine and contain” strategy to clear fuel sources. They shifted to aggressive suppression a week later as it rapidly grew to 7.8 square miles (20 square kilometers) because of hot temperatures, low humidity and strong wind gusts, fire officials said.
No injuries have been reported.
Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs called on the federal government late Sunday to investigate the National Park Service’s response to the wildfire.
“They must first take aggressive action to end the wildfire and prevent further damage,” she said in a post on X. “But Arizonans deserve answers for how this fire was allowed to decimate the Grand Canyon National Park.”
Millions of people visit the park annually, with most going to the more popular South Rim. The North Rim is open seasonally. It was evacuated last Thursday because of wildfire, and will remain closed for the rest of the season, the park said in a statement.
Firefighters at the North Rim and hikers in the inner canyon were evacuated over the weekend. The park said along with the fire risk, they could potentially be exposed to chlorine gas after the treatment plant burned. Chlorine gas is heavier than air and can lead to blurred vision, irritation or respiratory problems if high amounts of it are breathed in, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Rafters on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon also were told to bypass Phantom Ranch, which has a set of cabins and dormitories along the river.
Historic lodge burned
The Grand Canyon Lodge was often the first prominent feature that visitors see, even before viewing the canyon. A highway ends at the lodge, which was known for its sloped roof, huge ponderosa beams and massive limestone facade. By walking across the lobby and descending a stairwell, visitors could get their first view of the Grand Canyon shining through windows across the “Sun Room.”
“It just feels like you’re a pioneer when you walk through there (the lodge),” said Tim Allen, a longtime resident of Flagstaff, Arizona, and yearly visitor to the Grand Canyon. “It really felt like you were in a time gone by.”
Allen said the North Rim felt special and more personal because of its remoteness and reduced number of tourists. He often spent time there camping and doing rim-to-rim hikes, trekking all the way to the bottom of the canyon and back out.
“It’s heartbreaking,” he said of the destruction caused by the fire.
Caren Carney was staying at the lodge with her husband, parents and 12-year-old son when a park ranger knocked on their door Thursday and told them to evacuate. Carney’s parents first took her to the North Rim in the early 90s when she was 12, and the family decided to do the same with her son this year now that he was the same age. She was overjoyed to show her husband and son the serene beauty of the North Rim for the first time, and to bring her dad back to one of his favorite places in the world.
Carney said she was heartbroken Sunday to hear that such a “magical place” had burned down. After evacuating, the family from Georgia relocated to the South Rim to continue their vacation and they could see the blaze from across the canyon.
“We told my son while visiting that this is now a family tradition and he should bring his children when they are 12,” Carney said. I hope there will be something as magnificent for them to see in the future, and I’m so glad we got to have one final look at it in the present before it was lost.”
Aramark, the company that operated the lodge, said all employees and guests were safely evacuated.
“As stewards of some our country’s most beloved national treasures, we are devastated by the loss,” said spokesperson Debbie Albert.
An original lodge burned down from a kitchen fire in 1932, four years after construction was completed, according to the Grand Canyon Historical Society. The redesigned lodge using the original stonework opened in 1937.
Thomas Sulpizio, president of the historical society, said the lodge contained some valuable archives that he wasn’t sure were saved.
The lobby also contained a famous 600-pound bronze statue of a donkey named “Brighty the Burro.”
Meanwhile, officials reported progress in battling a second wildfire burning north of the Grand Canyon. Fire lines on the White Sage Fire that forced evacuations at the North Rim and in the community of Jacob Lake were holding, officials said. By Sunday afternoon the fire had charred 63 square miles (162 square kilometers) of terrain.
On the southern edge of the fire, hand crews and bulldozers were working uphill, and the spread of the blaze had been minimal.
But to the east and north, the fire has spread rapidly, with grasses and standing dead trees contributing to the fire’s intensity, officials said. The fire was pushing downhill toward the Vermilion Cliffs area, and crews were assessing opportunities to create buffer zones that help slow or halt the fire’s progress.
Wildfire closes national park in Colorado
Elsewhere, one of several wildfires burning in Colorado that closed Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, about 260 miles (420 kilometers) southwest of Denver, has burned 5.6 square miles (14.5 square kilometers) and forced the evacuation of homes near the park. The fire was started by lightning on Thursday on the south rim of the park, a dramatic, deep gorge carved by the Gunnison River.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis issued a disaster declaration on Sunday because of it and other fires burning in western Colorado. His office said they were all started the same day by the same storm.
Another wildfire burning near the Colorado-Utah border near La Sal, Utah, also started Thursday and has burned around 14 square miles (36.3 square kilometers).
South Korea medical students end 17-month class boycott

- South Korean health care was plunged into chaos early last year when then-president Yoon Suk Yeol moved to sharply increase medical school admissions
- The initiative met fierce protest, prompting junior doctors to walk away from hospitals and medical students to boycott their classrooms
SEOUL: Thousands of South Korean medical students are set to return to classrooms after a 17-month boycott, an industry body said Monday, ending part of a standoff which also saw junior doctors strike.
South Korean health care was plunged into chaos early last year when then-president Yoon Suk Yeol moved to sharply increase medical school admissions, citing an urgent need to boost doctor numbers to meet growing demand in a rapidly aging society.
The initiative met fierce protest, prompting junior doctors to walk away from hospitals and medical students to boycott their classrooms, with operations canceled and service provision disrupted nationwide.
The measure was later watered down, and the government eventually offered to scrap it in March 2025, after Yoon was impeached over his disastrous declaration of martial law.
“Students have agreed to return to school,” a spokesperson for the Korean Medical Association said Monday, adding that it was up to each medical school to decide the schedule for student returns.
The Korean Medical Students’ Association said in an earlier statement that the students had reached this decision because a continued boycott “could cause the collapse of the fundamentals of medical systems.”
Some 8,300 students are expected to return to school, but no specific timeline has been provided.
Prime Minister Kim Min-seok welcomed the decision, calling it a “big step forward” in a Facebook post Sunday, adding President Lee Jae Myung was deliberating ways to solve the issue.
In addition to the student boycott, some 12,000 junior doctors went on strike last year – with the vast majority of them still declining to return to work.
Lee – who took office in June after winning snap elections following Yoon’s removal from office – had said on the campaign trail he would seek to resolve the medical strike.
The increase in medical school admissions led to a record number of students re-taking the college entrance exam in November in a bid to capitalize on reforms that made it easier to get into coveted majors.
Hong Kong court hears appeals by jailed democracy campaigners

- They are among 45 opposition figures, including some of Hong Kong’s best-known democracy activists, who were sentenced in November
- Authorities arrested figures from a broad cross-section of the city’s opposition in morning raids in 2021, a group later dubbed the ‘Hong Kong 47’
HONG KONG: A Hong Kong court began hearing appeals on Monday from 12 democracy campaigners who were jailed for subversion last year during the city’s largest national security trial.
They were among 45 opposition figures, including some of Hong Kong’s best-known democracy activists, who were sentenced in November over a 2020 informal primary election that authorities deemed a subversive plot.
Critics including the United States, Britain and the European Union said the case showed how a Beijing-imposed national security law has eroded freedoms and quashed peaceful opposition in Hong Kong.
Ex-lawmakers “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung, Lam Cheuk-ting, Helena Wong and Raymond Chan are among those contesting their convictions and sentences in hearings that are scheduled to last 10 days.
Owen Chow, a 28-year-old activist who was sentenced to seven years and nine months in jail – the harshest penalty among the dozen – has also lodged an appeal.
Former district councilor Michael Pang withdrew his appeal application on Monday morning, leaving a total of 12 appellants.
Some of them have already spent more than four years behind bars.
Amnesty International’s China director Sarah Brooks said the appeal will be a “pivotal test” for free expression in the Chinese finance hub.
“Only by overturning these convictions can Hong Kong’s courts begin to restore the city’s global standing as a place where rights are respected and where people are allowed to peacefully express their views without fear of arrest,” Brooks said.
Dozens of police officers were deployed outside the West Kowloon court building on Monday morning as people queued to attend the hearing.
“They made a sacrifice... I hope they understand that Hongkongers have not forgotten them,” said a public hospital worker in his thirties surnamed Chow.
A 66-year-old retiree surnamed Chan said the case made him feel “helpless,” adding that fewer people were paying attention as court proceedings dragged on.
“I don’t expect any (positive) outcome, but I still want to support them.”
Prosecutors began Monday’s session by challenging the acquittal of lawyer Lawrence Lau, one of two people found not guilty in May 2024 from an original group of 47 accused.
Lau’s “overall conduct” showed that he was party to the conspiracy and he should be tried again because the lower court made the wrong factual finding, the prosecution argued.
Lau, representing himself, replied that the trial court’s findings should not be “casually interfered” with.
“… I have never advocated for the resignation of the chief executive, I have never advocated the indiscriminate vetoing of the financial budget,” Lau told the court, referring to core tenets of the alleged conspiracy.
Beijing has remolded Hong Kong in its authoritarian image after imposing a sweeping national security law in 2020 following months of huge, and sometimes violent, pro-democracy demonstrations.
Authorities arrested figures from a broad cross-section of the city’s opposition in morning raids in 2021, a group later dubbed the “Hong Kong 47.”
The group, aged between 27 and 69, included democratically elected lawmakers and district councilors, as well as unionists, academics and others with political stances ranging from modest reformists to radical localists.
They were accused of organizing or taking part in an unofficial primary election, which aimed to improve the chances of pro-democracy parties of winning a majority in the legislature.
The activists had hoped to force the government to accede to demands such as universal suffrage by threatening to indiscriminately veto the budget.
Three senior judges handpicked by the government to try security cases said the plan would have caused a “constitutional crisis.”
Search for Texas flood victims to resume after pause due to heavy rains

KERRVILLE, Texas: Crews on Monday were expected to resume looking for victims of catastrophic flooding in Texas that killed at least 132 people after more heavy rains temporarily paused their search and rescue operations.
Those efforts along the Guadalupe River were halted on Sunday after a new round of severe weather led to high water rescues elsewhere and prompted fears that waterways could surge again above their banks.
It was the first time search efforts for victims of the July Fourth floods were stopped due to severe weather. Authorities believe more than 160 people may still be missing in Kerr County alone, and 10 more in neighboring areas.
In Kerrville, where local officials have come under scrutiny over whether residents were adequately warned about the rising water in the early morning hours of July 4, authorities went door-to-door to some homes after midnight early Sunday to alert people that flooding was again possible. Authorities also pushed phone alerts to those in the area.
During the pause in searches, Ingram Fire Department officials ordered crews to immediately evacuate the Guadalupe River corridor in Kerr County, warning the potential for a flash flood was high.
Late Sunday afternoon, the Kerr County Sheriff’s Office announced that search teams in the western part of that county could resume their efforts. The Ingram Fire Department would resume its search and rescue efforts Monday morning, said agency spokesman Brian Lochte.
Latest flooding damages dozens of homes
Gov. Greg Abbott said on X the state conducted rescues of dozens of people in San Saba, Lampasas and Schleicher counties, and that evacuations were taking place in a handful of others.
The latest round of flooding damaged about 100 homes and knocked down untold lengths of cattle fencing, said Ashley Johnson, CEO of the Hill Country Community Action Association, a San Saba-based nonprofit.
“Anything you can imagine in a rural community was damaged,” she said. “Our blessing is it was daylight and we knew it was coming.”
With more rain on the way, county officials ordered everyone living in flood-prone areas near the San Saba River to evacuate, with people moved to the San Saba Civic Center, Johnson said.
A wide-ranging weather system brings heavy rains
The weather system brought slow-moving storms and multiple rounds of heavy rain across a widespread area, pushing rivers and streams over their banks.
The rains caused waterways to swell further north in Texas, where emergency crews rescued one motorist who was left stranded in waist-high rapids on a submerged bridge over the Bosque River.
“He drove into it and didn’t realize how deep it was,” said Jeff Douglas, president of the McGregor Volunteer Fire Department.
In the west Texas city of Sonora, authorities called for evacuations of some neighborhoods due to rising flood waters. Sonora is located about 110 miles (177 kilometers) northwest of Kerrville.
Kerrville residents get support from police, alerts
Under heavy rain, Matthew Stone on Sunday cleared branches and a log from a storm sewer in front of his home on Guadalupe Street in Kerrville as several inches of water pooled up on the road.
Multiple houses on the street overlooking the Guadalupe River were severely impacted by the July 4 floods. Stone said he felt safe for now.
“The cops have been coming back and forth, we’re getting lots of alerts, we’re getting a lot of support,” he said.
Just before daybreak on the Fourth of July, destructive, fast-moving waters rose 26 feet (8 meters) on the Guadalupe River, washing away homes and vehicles. Ever since, searchers have used helicopters, boats and drones to look for victims.
The floods laid waste to the Hill Country region of Texas. The riverbanks and hills of Kerr County are filled with vacation cabins, youth camps and campgrounds, including Camp Mystic, the century-old, all-girls Christian summer camp.
Located in a low-lying area along the Guadalupe River in a region known as flash flood alley, Camp Mystic lost at least 27 campers and counselors.
The flood was far more severe than the 100-year event envisioned by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, experts said, and moved so quickly in the middle of the night that it caught many off guard in a county that lacked a warning system.
Largest-ever warfighting drills in Australia, Exercise Talisman Sabre, is underway

- Talisman Sabre began in 2005 as a biennial joint exercise between the United States and Australia
- This year, more than 35,000 military personnel from 19 nations will take part over three weeks
MELBOURNE: The largest-ever warfighting drills in Australia, Exercise Talisman Sabre, is underway and expected to attract the attention of Chinese spy ships.
Talisman Sabre began in 2005 as a biennial joint exercise between the United States and Australia. This year, more than 35,000 military personnel from 19 nations, including Canada, Fiji, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, South Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Tonga, and the United Kingdom, will take part over three weeks, Australia’s defense department said on Sunday.
Malaysia and Vietnam are also attending as observers.
The exercise will also take part in Papua New Guinea, Australia’s nearest neighbor. It is the first time Talisman Sabre activities have been held outside Australia.
Chinese surveillance ships have monitored naval exercises off the Australian coast during the last four Talisman Sabre exercises and were expected to surveil the current exercise, Defense Industry Minister Pat Conroy said.
“The Chinese military have observed these exercises since 2017. It’d be very unusual for them not to observe it,” Conroy told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
“We’ll adjust accordingly. We’ll obviously observe their activities and monitor their presence around Australia, but we’ll also adjust how we conduct those exercises,” Conroy added.
Conroy said the Chinese were not yet shadowing ships as of Sunday.
The exercise officially started on Sunday with a ceremony in Sydney attended by Deputy Commanding General of US Army Pacific Lt. Gen. J.B. Vowell and Australia’s Chief of Joint Operations Vice-Adm. Justin Jones.
The exercise, showcasing Australia’s defense alliance with the United States, started a day after Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese began a six-day visit to China.
Albanese is expected to hold his fourth face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Tuesday.
The Australian leader has been criticized at home for failing to secure a face-to-face meeting with US President Donald Trump.