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Two FBI agents assigned to the investigation into alleged collusion between President Donald  Trump's campaign and Russia exchanged text messages referring to the future president as an "idiot,"  according to copies of messages turned over to Congress Tuesday night by the Justice Department. Special Counsel Robert Mueller removed one of the agents, Peter Strzok, from the Russia probe "immediately" after learning of the texts in late July, the department said in a letter to lawmakers. The messages, which were turned up during a Justice Department inspector general investigation into potential political influence on investigative decisions during the campaign, are fueling Republican calls for a second special counsel to investigate Mueller's operation. About 375 texts were handed over by the Justice Department, arriving on Capitol Hill the night before Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is expected to face a prolonged grilling in fron...

A Syracuse man has been charged with threatening to kill a U.S. congressman in an ominous call to the offices of Republican Rep. John Katko in upstate New York. Although he at first denied making the calls, the FBI says Angelo later admitted that he contacted the lawmaker because, according to the complaint, he was "upset" about the potential repeal of net neutrality rules, enacted under President Obama, that prohibit internet service providers like Comcast, AT&T and Verizon from slowing or blocking certain websites while prioritizing sites that pay for fast lanes. If convicted, Angelo faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, according to the Justice Department.  Katko's staff reported the voicemail to U.S. Capitol Police, who increased the lawmaker's security inside the beltway, the Justice Department said. FBI agents also notified the New York State Police and local law enforcement, who protect Katko's events i...

The new warnings from US-CERT come five months after a technical alert posted in June that implicated Hidden Cobra (which has also been called Lazarus Group and Guardians of the Peace by security experts) in a series of cyber attacks that date back to 2009 and include the 2014 Sony Pictures hack. The Department of Homeland Security team responsible for analyzing cybersecurity threats, has posted a warning about cyber attacks by the North Korean government, which it collectively refers to as “Hidden Cobra.” The technical alert from the FBI and Department of Homeland Security says a remote administration tool (RAT) called FALLCHILL has been deployed by Hidden Cobra since 2016 to target the aerospace, telecommunications and finance industries. FALLCHILL allows Hidden Cobra to issue commands to a victim’s server by dual proxies, which means it can potentially perform actions like retrieving information about all installed disks, accessing files, modifying file or director...