CIA 2010 covert communication websites Updated +Created
This article is about covert agent communication channel websites used by the CIA in many countries from the late 2000s until the early 2010s, when they were uncovered by counter intelligence of the targeted countries circa 2011-2013. This discovery led to the imprisonment and execution of several assets in Iran and China, and subsequent shutdown of the channel.
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/media/master/CIA_Star_Wars_website_promo.jpg
Video 1.
How I found a Star Wars website made by the CIA by Ciro Santilli
. Source. Slightly edited VOD of the talk Aratu Week 2024 Talk by Ciro Santilli: My Best Random Projects.
The existence of such websites was first reported in November 2018 by Yahoo News: www.yahoo.com/video/cias-communications-suffered-catastrophic-compromise-started-iran-090018710.html.
Previous whispers had been heard in 2017 but without clear mention of websites: www.nytimes.com/2017/05/20/world/asia/china-cia-spies-espionage.html:
Some were convinced that a mole within the C.I.A. had betrayed the United States. Others believed that the Chinese had hacked the covert system the C.I.A. used to communicate with its foreign sources. Years later, that debate remains unresolved.
[...]
From the final weeks of 2010 through the end of 2012, [...] the Chinese killed at least a dozen of the C.I.A.’s sources. [...] One was shot in front of his colleagues in the courtyard of a government building — a message to others who might have been working for the C.I.A.
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/media/master/Yahoo_CIA_website_article.png
Then in September 2022 a few specific websites were finally reported by Reuters: www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-spies-iran/, henceforth known only as "the Reuters article" in this article.
Figure 2.
Reuters reconstruction of what the applet would have looked like
. Source.
Figure 3.
Inspecting the Reuters article HTML source code
. Source. The Reuters article only gave one URL explicitly: iraniangoals.com. But most others could be found by inspecting the HTML of the screenshots provided, except for the Carson website.
Ciro Santilli heard about the 2018 article at around 2020 while studying for his China campaign because the websites had been used to take down the Chinese CIA network in China. He even asked on Quora: www.quora.com/What-were-some-examples-of-the-websites-that-the-CIA-used-around-2010-as-a-communication-mechanism-for-its-spies-in-China-and-Iran-but-were-later-found-and-used-to-take-down-their-spy-networks but there were no publicly known domains at the time to serve as a starting point. Chris, Electrical Engineer and former Avionics Tech in the US Navy, even replied suggesting that obviously the CIA is so competent that it would never ever have its sites leaked like that:
Seriously a dumb question.
So when Ciro Santilli heard about the 2022 article almost a year after publication, and being a half-arsed web developer himself, he knew he had to try and find some of the domains himself using the newly available information! It was an irresistible real-life capture the flag. The thing is, everyone who has ever developed a website knows that its attack surface is about the size of Texas, and the potential for fingerprinting is off the charts with so many bits and pieces sticking out. Chris, get fucked.
Figure 4.
"Seriously a dumb question" Quora answer by Chris from the US Navy
. Source.
In particular, it is fun to have such a clear and visible to anyone examples of the USA spying on its own allies in the form of Wayback Machine archives.
Given that it was reported that there were "more than 350" such websites, it would be really cool if we could uncover more of those websites ourselves beyond the 9 domains reported by Reuters!
This article documents the list of extremely likely candidates Ciro has found so far, mostly using:
more details on methods also follow. It is still far from the 885 websites reported by citizenlabs, so there must be key techniques missing. But the fact that there are no Google Search hits for the domains or IPs (except in bulk e.g. in expired domain trackers) indicates that these might not have been previously clearly publicly disclosed.
If anyone can find others, or has better techniques: Section "How to contact Ciro Santilli". The techniques used so far have been very heuristic, and that added to the limited amount of data makes it almost certain that several IP ranges have been missed. There are two types of contributions that would be possible:
Perhaps the current heuristically obtained data can serve as a good starting for a more data-oriented search that will eventually find a valuable fingerprint which brings the entire network out.
Disclaimer: the network fell in 2013, followed by fully public disclosures in 2018 and 2022, so we believe it is now more than safe for the public to know what can still be uncovered about the events that took place. The main author's political bias is strongly pro-democracy and anti-dictatorship.
May this list serve as a tribute to those who spent their days making, using, and uncovering these websites under the shadows.
If you want to go into one of the best OSINT CTFs of your life, stop reading now and see how many Web Archives you can find starting only from the Reuters article as Ciro did. Some guidelines:
  • there was no ultra-clean fingerprint found yet. Some intuitive and somewhat guessy data analysis was needed. But when you clean the data correctly and make good guesses, many hits follow, it feels so good
  • nothing was paid for data. But using cybercafe Wifi's for a few extra IPs may help.
Figure 5.
viewdns.info activegameinfo.com domain to IP
. Source.
Figure 6.
viewdns.info aroundthemiddleeast.com IP to domain
. Source.
Figure 7. . Source. This source provided valuable historical domain to IP data. It was likely extracted with an illegal botnet. Data excerpt from the CSVs:
amazon.com,2012-02-01T21:33:36,72.21.194.1
amazon.com,2012-02-01T21:33:36,72.21.211.176
amazon.com,2013-10-02T19:03:39,72.21.194.212
amazon.com,2013-10-02T19:03:39,72.21.215.232
amazon.com.au,2012-02-10T08:03:38,207.171.166.22
amazon.com.au,2012-02-10T08:03:38,72.21.206.80
google.com,2012-01-28T05:33:40,74.125.159.103
google.com,2012-01-28T05:33:40,74.125.159.104
google.com,2013-10-02T19:02:35,74.125.239.41
google.com,2013-10-02T19:02:35,74.125.239.46
Figure 8.
The four communication mechanisms used by the CIA websites
. Java Applets, Adobe Flash, JavaScript and HTTPS
Figure 9.
Expired domain names by day 2011
. Source. The scraping of expired domain trackers to Github was one of the positive outcomes of this project.
Video 2.
Compromised Comms by Darknet Diaries (2023)
Source.
It was the YouTube suggestion for this video that made Ciro Santilli aware of the Reuters article almost one year after its publication, which kickstarted his research on the topic.
Full podcast transcript: darknetdiaries.com/transcript/75/
2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup Updated +Created
We've noticed that often when there is a hit range:
  • there is only one IP for each domain
  • there is a range of about 20-30 of those
and that this does not seem to be that common. Let's see if that is a reasonable fingerprint or not.
Note that although this is the most common case, we have found multiple hits that viewdns.info maps to the same IP.
First we create a table u (unique) that only have domains which are the only domain for an IP, let's see by how much that lowers the 191 M total unique domains:
time sqlite3 u.sqlite 'create table t (d text, i text)'
time sqlite3 av.sqlite -cmd "attach 'u.sqlite' as u" "insert into u.t select min(d) as d, min(i) as i from t where d not like '%.%.%' group by i having count(distinct d) = 1"
The not like '%.%.%' removes subdomains from the counts so that CGI comms are still included, and distinct in count(distinct is because we have multiple entries at different timestamps for some of the hits.
Let's start with the 208 subset to see how it goes:
time sqlite3 av.sqlite -cmd "attach 'u.sqlite' as u" "insert into u.t select min(d) as d, min(i) as i from t where i glob '208.*' and d not like '%.%.%' and (d like '%.com' or d like '%.net') group by i having count(distinct d) = 1"
OK, after we fixed bugs with the above we are down to 4 million lines with unique domain/IP pairs and which contains all of the original hits! Almost certainly more are to be found!
This data is so valuable that we've decided to upload it to: archive.org/details/2013-dns-census-a-novirt.csv Format:
8,chrisjmcgregor.com
11,80end.com
28,fine5.net
38,bestarabictv.com
49,xy005.com
50,cmsasoccer.com
80,museemontpellier.net
100,newtiger.com
108,lps-promptservice.com
111,bridesmaiddressesshow.com
The numbers of the first column are the IPs as a 32-bit integer representation, which is more useful to search for ranges in.
To make a histogram with the distribution of the single hostname IPs:
#!/usr/bin/env bash
bin=$((2**24))
sqlite3 2013-dns-census-a-novirt.sqlite -cmd '.mode csv' >2013-dns-census-a-novirt-hist.csv <<EOF
select i, sum(cnt) from (
  select floor(i/${bin}) as i,
         count(*) as cnt
    from t
    group by 1
  union
  select *, 0 as cnt from generate_series(0, 255)
)
group by i
EOF
gnuplot \
  -e 'set terminal svg size 1200, 800' \
  -e 'set output "2013-dns-census-a-novirt-hist.svg"' \
  -e 'set datafile separator ","' \
  -e 'set tics scale 0' \
  -e 'unset key' \
  -e 'set xrange[0:255]' \
  -e 'set title "Counts of IPs with a single hostname"' \
  -e 'set xlabel "IPv4 first byte"' \
  -e 'set ylabel "count"' \
  -e 'plot "2013-dns-census-a-novirt-hist.csv" using 1:2:1 with labels' \
;
Which gives the following useless noise, there is basically no pattern:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/media/master/cia-2010-covert-communication-websites/2013-dns-census-a-novirt-hist.svg
Hits with nearby IP hits Updated +Created
alljohnny.com: one of the Reuters websites.
62.22.60.49: telecom-headlines.com. Found with: visual inspection of full 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup list just before worldnewsnetworking.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 62.22.60.34 - 62.22.60.66
  • 62.22.60.33: newsperk.com. Unclear. Stylistically perfect, but no comms not found. 2011. English. Egypt. news.
  • 62.22.60.34: freeslideshow.net. Legit? Attempting to open any HTML archives leads to an infinite page load loop, e.g. 2010. A subpage however exists: web.archive.org/web/20101230001640/http://freeslideshow.net/index_files/a.htm and appears legit.
  • 62.22.60.40: travel-passage.com. Unclear. No archives of toplevel, only subpage: 2009. No clear comms. Chinese.
  • 62.22.60.42: newsupdatesite.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.46: flyingtimeline.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.47: globalemergenceadvisorsbkserver.com. Legit.
  • 62.22.60.48: currentcommunique.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.49: telecom-headlines.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.52: collectedmedias.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.54: romulusactualites.com. No archives.
  • 62.22.60.55: thefilmcentre.com. Hit.
  • 62.22.60.56: traveltimenews.com. Hit.
62.22.61.206 worldnewsnetworking.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 62.22.61.188 - 62.22.61.224
63.131.229.12 cyberreportagenews.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 63.131.228.248 - 63.131.229.30
  • 63.131.229.2: fightskillsresource.com. Hit
  • 63.131.229.4: unitedterritorynews.com. Hit
  • 63.131.229.9: show-dustry.com. Hit
  • 63.131.229.10: afghanpoetry.net. Hit. Also at 74.254.12.166 in another range.
  • 63.131.229.11: mythriftytrip.com. Hit
  • 63.131.229.12: cyberreportagenews.com. Hit.
  • 63.131.229.13: sunrise-news.com. Hit.
  • 63.131.229.15: cricketnewsforindia.com. Archive quite broken, likely hit.
  • 63.131.229.16:
    • nutricion-saludable.info. No archives.
    • nutricion-saludable.net. Hit.
  • 63.131.229.18: itnl-xchange.com. Hit.
  • 63.131.229.20:
    • fixashion.net. Hit.
    • a few others
63.130.160.50 theglobalheadlines.com. Found with: 2013 DNS census secureserver.net MX records intersection 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup. Tested viewdns.info range: 63.130.160.35 - 63.130.160.75
  • 63.130.160.50: theglobalheadlines.com. Hit.
  • 63.130.160.51:
    • hai-pow.com. Hit.
    • secudenetworksecurity.com. No archives.
  • 63.130.160.53: echessnews.com. Hit.
  • 63.130.160.59: technologiewissen.com. No archives from the time. Would be Technology knowledge in German, so another likely German hit. Shame.
  • 63.130.160.60: boxingstop.net. Hit.
  • 63.130.160.61: bookmarksthis.com. No archives.
  • 63.130.160.62: azerinews.org. Hit.
64.16.204.55 holein1news.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 64.16.204.50 - 64.16.204.63. With did Wayback Machine have so few archives here? TODO stopping viewdns.info exploration a bit short due to that.
  • 64.16.204.35: ironcityfootball.com. Legit/broke.
  • 64.16.204.51: africannewsandsports.com. No archives. rdns source: viewdns.info
  • 64.16.204.53: bosniakbusinessnews.com. No archives. A Bosniak is someone from an ethnicity from Bosnia.
  • 64.16.204.54: affairesdumonde.com. No archives. rdns source: viewdns.info
  • 64.16.204.55: holein1news.com. Hit.
  • 64.16.204.56: fightorgohome.com. No archives. rdns source: viewdns.info
  • 64.16.204.58: tech-topix.com. Hit.
  • 64.16.204.60: pakpoldaily.com. No archives. rdns source: viewdns.info. TODO meaning? Might be Indonesian, maybe linked to police: www.facebook.com/watch/?v=880204266271955
65.61.127.163 capture-nature.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-65-61-96-0-1/pft?s=65.61.127.163: Net Range: 65.61.96.0 - 65.61.127.255. Organization. Name: TierPoint, LLC. Tested viewdns.info range: 65.61.127.149 -
66.45.179.205 noticiasporjanua.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.45.179.187 - 66.45.179.223
  • 66.45.179.187: mail03.gatesfoundation.org. Legit.
  • 66.45.179.192: thegraceofislam.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.193: arabicnewsunfiltered.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.194: raulsonsglobalnews.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.195: aryannews.net. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.199: attivitaestremi.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.200: foodwineandsuch.com. No archives.
  • 66.45.179.201: hitthepavementnow.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.203: noticiascontinental.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.205: noticiasporjanua.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.206: podisticamondiale.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.207: reflectordenoticias.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.208: havenofgamerz.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.209: vejaaeuropa.com. web.archive.org/web/20130810131440/http://www.vejaaeuropa.com/: Welcome to the US Petabox. Shame, could be another Brazil hit since "veja" (look in Brazilian Portuguese) would be "mira" in Spanish, not "veja".
  • 66.45.179.210: sa-michigan.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.211: absolutebearing.net. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.212: grandretirement.net. No archives.
  • 66.45.179.213: myportaltonews.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.214: investmentintellect.com. Hit.
  • 66.45.179.215: nigeriastar.net 2012-03-12. Hit.
66.104.169.184 bcenews.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.104.169.158 - 66.104.169.189
  • 66.104.169.162: bestsportsnews.net. Archive broken.
  • 66.104.169.163: doctorsoncallsite.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.164: lightandshadowonline.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.168: plugged-into-news.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.169: worldsportsite.com. Likely hit, but comms not found. 2011. Arabic. . sports. has some apparently unrelated archives from 2008.
  • 66.104.169.171: golf-on-holiday.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.172: perspectiva-noticias.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.175: aquaswimming.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.177: dojo-temple.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.179: neighbour-news.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.180: medicatechinfo.com. Hit.
    • 205.178.189.131: securitytrails.com 2009-06-25 - 2009-07-02 Network Solutions, LLC., "ip_count": 726755. Moved to new one 2009-07-02 - 2010-11-03
  • 66.104.169.181: brickmanfinancialnews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.182: casanewsnow.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.183: aworldofnews.com. No archives.
  • 66.104.169.184: bcenews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.169.197: teamshula.com. Legit.
66.104.173.186 myworldlymusic.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.104.173.158 - 66.104.173.194
  • 66.104.173.161: fanatic-pc-gamers.com. 2013: Welcome to the US Petabox
  • 66.104.173.163: runakonews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.164: shoppingadventure.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.165: entertaining-ly.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.166: zubeenews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.169: smart-financeology.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.173: remarkably has two potential hits, both shown in viewdns.info, and one of them was also in the 2013 DNS Census.
    • worldfeedstoday.com. No main page archives. Subpage archive: 2011. English. news.
    • world-newsfeeds.com. No archives.
  • 66.104.173.175: media-coverage-now.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.176: jbc-online-news.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.177: webscooper.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.178: dk-dcinvestment.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.179: newsforthetech.com. Welcome to the US Petabox.
  • 66.104.173.180: stara-turistick.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.181: playbackpolitics.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.182: snapnewsfront.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.183: ingenuitytrendz.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.184: armashoy.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.185: baocontact.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.186: myworldlymusic.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.173.189: hitpoint-gaming.com. Hit.
66.104.175.40 beyondnetworknews.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-66-104-0-0-1/pft?s=66.104.175.40. Net Range:66.104.0.0 - 66.107.255.255. 2012 Internet Census puts most/all hits in this range under ip66-104-175-34.z175-104-66.customer.algx.net, algx.net redirects to verizon.com as of 2023. Related: superuser.com/questions/956568/why-are-my-pings-going-to-customer-algx-net. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.104.175.24 - unknown
  • 66.104.175.34: itwebtoday.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.35: drglobalnews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.36: adilnews.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.37: technewstogo.com. web.archive.org/web/20110201205946/http://technewstogo.com/ "UNDER CONSTRUCTION"
  • 66.104.175.40: beyondnetworknews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.41: grubbersworldrugbynews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.44: yourtripfinder.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.45: rollinsnetwork.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.46: infosharenews.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.47: southasiaheadlines.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.48: worlddispatch.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.49: webworldsports.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.50: fly-bybirdies.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.51: businessexchangetoday.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.52: mensajeradenoticias.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.53: info-ology.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.54: marketflows.net. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.57: metanewsdaily.com. Hit.
  • 66.104.175.218: remote.taxconsultantsgroup.com. No archives.
66.175.106.148 activegaminginfo.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-66-175-106-128-1/pft?s=66.175.106.148: Net Range: 66.175.106.128 - 66.175.106.159. Customer Name: DIAMOND-COLESON. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.175.106.131 - 66.175.106.178
  • 66.175.106.10: nationalchecktrust.com. Legit?
  • 66.175.106.134: paddlescoop.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.137: kessingerssportsnews.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.138: factorforcenews.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.140: aroundthemiddleeast.com. No Wayback Machine hits. Last resolved: 2012-06-29.
  • 66.175.106.142: kanata-news.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.143: thecricketfan.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.146: inews-today.com. Initially found with 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches which gave IP address 193.203.49.212. But that has no nearby hits. 66.175.106.146 was later found on viewdns.info, and slotted into this other existing IP range.
    • 193.203.49.211 datingso.com: legit? Russian dating website
    • 193.203.49.212 inews-today.com. Hit.
    • 193.203.49.223 zatysi.net: legit
    • 193.203.49.226 kinotopik.com: legit? Russian
    • 193.203.49.229 rotor-volgograd.com. Legit.
    • 193.203.49.233 ordercytotec.com. Broken.
  • 66.175.106.147: starwarsweb.net. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.149: feedsdemexicoyelmundo.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.150: noticiasmusica.net. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.155: atomworldnews.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.158: nouvellesetdesrapports.com. Hit.
  • 66.175.106.166: exchange.katzbarron.com. Legit. Reverse IP source: 2012 Internet Census
  • 66.175.106.183: mail.lfdatacenter.com. No archives.
66.237.236.247 comunidaddenoticias.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 66.237.236.222 - 66.237.236.254
  • 66.237.236.227: newsandmusicminute.com. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.229: pearls-playlist.com 2011-11-13. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.230: beyondthefringe.info 2013-01-02. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.231: primetimemovies.net 2011-06-22. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.235: persephneintl.com. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.236: directoalgrano.net 2012-01-23. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.240: actualizaciondebeisbol.com. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.243: mygadgettech.com. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.247: comunidaddenoticias.com. Hit.
  • 66.237.236.249: sumerjaseahora.com. Hit.
69.84.156.90 stickshiftnews.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 69.84.156.64 - 69.84.156.95
  • 69.84.156.69: al-ashak-news-me.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.70: theventurenews.info. No archives. business.
  • 69.84.156.71: worldfinancetoday.net. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.72: autonewsarabia.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.74: blue-moon-news.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.75: theoutergreen.com. No archives. Might have been another golf hit.
  • 69.84.156.76: tnc-urdu.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.79: jassimnews.com. No archives/broken.
  • 69.84.156.80: noticiasdenuestromundo.com. No archives. Spanish. news.
  • 69.84.156.82: arabicnewsonline.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.83: unganadormundial.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.84: focusonbokeh.com. No archives/broken. Only a "Sony" logo remains: web.archive.org/web/20110207222330/http://focusonbokeh.com/images/logo_014.jpg
  • 69.84.156.85: classic-rocktopia.com. No archives. Presumably rock climbing.
  • 69.84.156.87: i7diver.com. No archives.
  • 69.84.156.88: diariodeelmundo.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.89: todaysarabnews.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.90: stickshiftnews.com. Hit.
  • 69.84.156.91: theinternationalgoal.com. Hit.
74.116.72.236 techtopnews.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 74.116.72.215 - 74.116.72.254
  • 74.116.72.199: newsungraphics.com. Legit.
  • 74.116.72.209: newsung.com. Legit/broken.
  • 74.116.72.214: ofinancialinc.com. Legit.
  • 74.116.72.219: stockpromoters.com. Legit.
  • 74.116.72.227: dayenews.com. hit.
  • 74.116.72.229: guide-daventure.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.230: spaceage-exchange.com. No archives.
  • 74.116.72.231: bleachersfootballnews.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.232: indirectfreekick.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.233: wwiichronicles.net. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.234: petroleumagenews.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.235: the-open-book-online.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.236: techtopnews.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.237: noticiasdiariasdedeportes.com. No archives. Sad, another potential Brazil hit.
  • 74.116.72.238: pohandakhbar.com. No archives. TODO meaning. "akhbar" is news in Arabic. But what is "Poh"? Sounds like a South Asian name.
  • 74.116.72.239: crickettoday.info. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.240: zafernews.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.241: itechnewstoday.com. Broken/GoDaddy takeover
  • 74.116.72.242: gdgtsource.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.243: waronfilmonline.com. No archives.
  • 74.116.72.244: arborstribune.org. No archives.
  • 74.116.72.245: wineenthusiastonline.com. Welcome to the US Petabox.
  • 74.116.72.246: vuvuzelanews.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.247: ballbatstumpsandbails.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.248: kioni-sailing.com. No archives.
  • 74.116.72.249: round-trip-travel.com. Hit.
  • 74.116.72.250: arabicnewsource.com. Hit.
74.254.12.168 non-stop-news.net. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 74.254.12.158 - 74.254.12.195. This domain exceptionally also has a second IP also with multihits: 207.239.196.230. The fact that the range has rdns sources with hits from both 2013 DNS Census and viewdns.info suggests this range is correct.
  • 74.254.12.163: half-court.net. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.163: dailywellnessnews.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.165: dylandon.net. Hit. rdns source: viewdns.info.
  • 74.254.12.166: afghanpoetry.net. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.168: non-stop-news.net. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.169: soldiersofsouthasia.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.170: greek-news.info. 2013. Welcome to the US Petabox. rdns source: viewdns.info
  • 74.254.12.171: autism-news.org. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.172: thesportsguidebook.com. rdns source: 2013 DNS Census. Only has archive of one subpage: 2009. English. sports.
  • 74.254.12.174: reliefline.info. web.archive.org/web/20090416064302/http://www.reliefline.info:80/ Archive too broken.
  • 74.254.12.176: pakcricketgrd.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.177: networkofnews.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.179: wineconnaisseur.net. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.180: helpinghandssite.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.185: newskwest.com. No archives.
  • 74.254.12.187: efiinvestment.com. No archives.
  • 74.254.12.188: first-tee-golf.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.189: fabu-foto.com. Hit.
  • 74.254.12.190: viptravelabroad.com. Hit.
199.85.212.118 just-kidding-news.com
  • 199.85.212.118 rdns source: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches, dnshistory.org (2009-09-23 -> 2011-01-25) and viewdns.info: "location": "United States", "owner": "VIMRO, LLC", "lastseen": "2012-01-11". Tested viewdns.info range: 199.85.212.95 - 199.85.212.128. Not sure worth it given the many 2013 DNS Census misses surrounding.
    • 199.85.212.98: colorsxpress.com. Legit
    • 199.85.212.104:
      • jobindons.com 2013-10-19.
      • piogroup.org 2012-12-29.
    • 199.85.212.105: mide-news.com. Hit.
    • 199.85.212.109: game2be.com. Infinite load loop: web.archive.org/web/20080102074404/http://www.game2be.com/
    • 199.85.212.111:
      • newsandsportscentral.com. Hit.
      • and many many others, not bothering with it
    • 199.85.212.115: veryperi.com. Legit? 2011. Style is similar.
    • 199.85.212.116: approselect.com. Legit?
    • 199.85.212.117: innovative-software-solutions.com. broken/legit
    • 199.85.212.118: just-kidding-news.com. Hit.
    • 199.85.212.119: invisus.com. Legit
    • 199.85.212.120: allurebyjustine.com. Legit?
    • 199.85.212.121: stockprouniversity.com
    • 199.85.212.122: stjosephswoodshop.com Legit?
    • 199.85.212.125: time-spacer.net. Welcome to the US Petabox.
    • 199.85.212.132: qualitytrans.net. Legit?
    • 199.85.212.134: mywellnessminder.com. Legit?
    • 199.85.212.138: crystalglassinc.com
    • 199.85.212.140: davistech-llc.com
  • 68.178.232.100: see rastadirect.net. rdns source: viewdns.info: "location": "United States", "owner": "GoDaddy.com, LLC", "lastseen": "2012-06-29"
  • 209.85.45.84. Tested viewdns.info range: 209.85.45.74 - 209.85.45.94.
    • 209.85.45.2: dz8.dailyrazor.com
    • 209.85.45.2: jr4consulting.com
    • 209.85.45.41: guitarzza.com. No archives of time.
    • 209.85.45.46: evergraindecking.com. No archives of time.
    • 209.85.45.114: mauritiuspropertyconsultant.com. Legit/ broken.
    • 209.85.45.160: bieltvedt.net. No archives of time.
    • 209.85.45.160: golfstats.dk. No archives.
    • 209.85.45.225: infokus.ca
    • 209.85.45.225: mail.tomlatham.net
    • 209.85.45.225: mail.tomlatham.org
    • 209.85.45.239: flavacationcenter.com
204.176.38.143 noticiassofisticadas.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup. Tested viewdns.info range: 204.176.38.125 - 204.176.38.154
  • 204.176.38.130: i-pressnews.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.132: turkishnewslinks.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.134: photographyarecord.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.135: breakingthewicket.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.136: politicalworldtoday.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.137: hi-tech-today.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.138: continental-business-news.com. TODO. 2011. Cannot find comms. Also header and footer are not limited width which is unusual. Further HTML similarity reversing would be needed.
  • 204.176.38.139: bigscreenbattles.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.141: rakotafootball.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.142: senderosdemontana.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.143: noticiassofisticadas.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.144: techno-today.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.145: tickettonews.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.146: dps-digitalphotosharing.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.147: theputtingreen.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.149: sportsnewstodayar.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.38.150: kairuafricanews.com. Hit.
204.176.39.115 globalprovincesnews.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 204.176.39.93 - 204.176.39.124
  • 204.176.39.97: beamingnews.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.98: cubriendonoticias.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.100: rowleyworldpost.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.101: noticiastopicas.com. No archives.
  • 204.176.39.103: economicnewsbuzz.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.104: spectranewsonline.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.105: entertainmentnewscompany.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.107: guidetoelectronics.net. Uncertain. 2010. English. tech, electronics. Possible CGI comms variant.
  • 204.176.39.110: arabnewsatdawn.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.114: messengergalaxy.com. Uncertain. 2011. Would be the first example of something more commercial/service offering we've seen so far. Possible CGI comms variant.
  • 204.176.39.115: globalprovincesnews.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.116: mahparah-news.com. Hit.
  • 204.176.39.119: commercialspacedesign.com. Hit.
207.210.250.132 aeronet-news.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 207.210.250.126 - 207.210.250.157
  • 207.210.250.131: starrynightnews.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.132: aeronet-news.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.133: bakaribulletin.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.134: deprensaenlarevisiondehoy.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.135: icwb-news.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.136: sportsreelhighlights.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.137: fashionforward.info. No archives.
  • 207.210.250.138: inquiry-human-past.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.139: thefairwaysaregreen.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.142: russiaupdate.com 2011-11-13. No archives of the time, only older unrelated archives: web.archive.org/web/20010429003443/http://russiaupdate.com/.
  • 207.210.250.143: archaeologyreview.net. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.144: highspeed-news.com. No archives.
  • 207.210.250.146: noticias-caracas.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.147: bailandstump.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.148: classicalmusic4arab.com. No archives.
  • 207.210.250.149: globalventurestat.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.152: al-rashidrealestate.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.153: newsintheworld-ru.com. Hit.
  • 207.210.250.154: news-unlimited.info. No archives. Shame, as perfect theme, and has per ipinf.ru/domains/207.210.250.154/
208.254.40.117 worldnewsandent.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-208-192-0-0-1/pft?s=208.254.40.117: Net Range 208.192.0.0 - 208.255.255.255. Tested viewdns.info range: 208.254.40.92 - 208.254.40.135
  • 208.254.40.96: sixty2media.com. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.99: newspoliticssource.com. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.110 musical-fortune.net. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.113: ashoka-gemstones.com. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.117: worldnewsandent.com. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.124: riskandrewardnews.com. Hit.
  • 208.254.40.129: mailb.casella.com. Legit.
208.254.42.205 driversinternationalgolf.com. Not too far from 208.254.40.117 right? Tested viewdns.info range: 208.254.42.178 - 208.254.42.233.
210.80.75.55 philippinenewsonline.net. Tested viewdns.info range: 210.80.75.30 - 210.80.75.67
  • 210.80.75.35: aroundtheworldnews.net. No archives. ipinf.ru/domains/210.80.75.33/ disagrees and places it at .33.
  • 210.80.75.36: e-commodities.net. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.37: trekkingtoday.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.41: multinews-33.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.42: movimientodenticias.com. No archives.
  • 210.80.75.43: gulfandmiddleeastnews.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.44: whirlybirdinflight.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.45: kings-game.net. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.46: topglobalnewsdaily.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.49: recipe-dujour.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.53: sportsman-elite.com. No archives.
  • 210.80.75.55: philippinenewsonline.net. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.56: technewsforme.com. Hit.
  • 210.80.75.59: goldeportesnoticias.com. No archives.
  • 210.80.75.68: gigabyte-usa.com. Legit.
212.4.16.232 mynewscheck.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.4.16.214 - 212.4.17.10.
Other hits:
  • 208.91.197.132. rdns source: viewdns.info: "location" : "British Virgin Islands", "owner" : "Confluence Networks Inc", "lastseen" : "2013-09-26". So this is after the previous one, unlikely to be correct.
  • 205.178.189.131. source: securitytrails.com
212.4.17.38 fightwithoutrules.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-208-192-0-0-1/pft?s=208.254.40.117. Net Range: 208.192.0.0 - 208.255.255.255. Organization: Name: Verizon Business. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.4.17.8 - 212.4.17.79
  • 212.4.17.41: newtechfrontier.com. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.43: smart-travel-consultant.com. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.46: atentlaloc.com. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.53: newsresolution.net. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.56: lesummumdelafinance.com. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.56: thepinnacleoffinance.com. No Wayback machine archives.
  • 212.4.17.61: tech-stop.org. Archive: 2011. Feels likely. No commons found. .org hit? Has subdomain "gear.tech-stop.org" according to 2013 DNS Census, which suggests CGI comms, but no links to it
  • 212.4.17.98: topbillingsite.com. Hit.
  • 212.4.17.122: b2bworldglobal.com. Hit.
There were also some other reverse IP hits for fightwithoutrules.com, but no CIA websites there:
  • 204.11.56.25 - British Virgin Islands - Confluence Networks Inc - 2013-09-26. Many domains.
  • 208.91.197.19 - British Virgin Islands - Confluence Networks Inc - 2013-05-20. Many domains.
212.4.18.129 sightseeingnews.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.4.18.115 - 212.4.18.148. TODO expand. Interesting wide/sparse range? Or perhaps it's two separate ranges?
212.209.74.105 globalbaseballnews.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.209.74.100 - 212.209.74.132. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches
  • 212.209.74.105: globalbaseballnews.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.106: football-de-luxe.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.111: worldconcerns.info. No archives.
  • 212.209.74.112: developmental-league.com. Unclear. CGI comms variant? 2010. English. CGI. American football.
  • 212.209.74.115: mediocampodefutbol.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.117: myengineeringaffinity.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.122: atthemovies.biz. Archive very broken. Has link to unarchived JAR: web.archive.org/web/20110809232811oe_/http://www.atthemovies.biz/movieslides.jar. Would have been the fist .biz hit found: Non .com .net TLDs
  • 212.209.74.123: worldfinancialexchangenews.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.124: urouttahere.com. No archives. Meaning presumably "you're out of here"? One wonders what the theme would have been!
  • 212.209.74.125: avoilurefixe.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.74.126: headlines2day.com. Hit.
    • 118.139.174.11. Reverse IP source: viewdns.info
      • 118.139.174.11: 712 domain hits on it
      • 118.139.174.21: theargentineanwineco.com 2013-09-26. No Wayback machine archive.
      • nothing else on the +-20 range
    • 184.168.221.91. Reverse IP source: 2013 DNS Census
  • 212.209.74.127: construction-zones.com. Unclear. CGI comms variant? 2009. No known comms found. English. construction. Has a login page: web.archive.org/web/20091130144158/http://construction-zones.com/login.html so maybe CGI comms variant
212.209.79.40 hydradraco.com. Found with: visual inspection of full 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup list just after globalbaseballnews.com. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.209.79.35 - 212.209.79.63
  • 212.209.79.34: fgnl.net. Hit. securitytrails.com provides IP history:
    • 212.209.79.34: 2008-09-01 - 2010-04-19.
    • 212.4.18.133: 2010-04-19 - 2019-06-19. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.4.18.122 - 212.4.18.148
    both under MCI Communications Services, Inc. d/b/a Verizon Business.
  • 212.209.79.37: fitness-sources.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.40: hydradraco.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.41: noticiasdelmundolatino.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.42: suparakuvi.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.44: myigadgets.net. Unclear. 2010. tech. Contains some helpers to: iGoogle. This page is very interesting. and quite different from the others, as it contains highly specialized functionality. No known comms found. The choice of homepage languages is also very suspicious: Arabic, Farsi, French, Chinese and Spanish.
  • 212.209.79.46: cetusdelph.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.47: willtoworship.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.48: themvconnection.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.51: pi-resources.net. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.52: newel-adserver.com. Redirects to newel.com which is legit.
  • 212.209.79.53: ourscubaworld.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.58: tech-love-home.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.60: first-solo-aviation.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.79.61: china-destinations.org. Hit.
212.209.90.84 thenewseditor.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 212.209.90.64 - 212.209.90.99
  • 212.209.90.69: worldedgenews.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.72: talkingpointnews.info. No archives.
  • 212.209.90.75: prebitinvestment.com. No archives.
  • 212.209.90.77: energy-bulb.com 2011. English. energy. Comms not found, but has unarchived link to: web.archive.org/web/20110128182345/https://webmail.energy-bulb.com/login.html. CGI comms variant?
  • 212.209.90.79: freeblink.com. No archives for timerange, then legit.
  • 212.209.90.80: nsmovies.net. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.82: middleeastjournal.net. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.84: thenewseditor.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.87: newsandweathersource.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.89: pakisports.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.90: vriha-aesthetics.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.92: amishkanews.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.93: theentertainbiz.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.90.94: eurosportssummary.com. Hit.
  • 212.209.91.14: teracom.net. Legit
216.105.98.152: modernarabicnews.com. Found with: 2013 DNS Census virtual host cleanup heuristic keyword searches. Tested viewdns.info range: 216.105.98.125 - 216.105.98.167
  • 216.105.98.118:
    • estudashboard.com: broken
    • fintrade.us: legit
  • 216.105.98.132: europeantravelcafe.com. Likely a hit, but comms not found. 2010. English. Europe. travel. Marked copyright 2009. There's a currency converter at: web.archive.org/web/20100724024644/http://www.europeantravelcafe.com/tools.html which could be suspicious.
  • 216.105.98.134: fuenteneta.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.135: ilat-news.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.136: etherealinspirations.net. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.137: the-news-zone.com. Archive very broken: web.archive.org/web/20130814194744/http://the-news-zone.com/
  • 216.105.98.138: photozoomnews.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.139: cultura-digital.net. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.140: uaeshoppingspree.com. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.141: jabarifootball.com. No archives. "Jabari" is a Swahili/Arabic name[ref]
  • 216.105.98.142: globalreview-ar.com. No archives. Shame, could have been our first Argentinian site.
  • 216.105.98.144: garanziadellasicurezza.com. Archives quite broken: web.archive.org/web/20110424044637/http://www.garanziadellasicurezza.com:80/ Unarchived JAR: /web/20110424044637oe_/http://www.garanziadellasicurezza.com/garanzia.jar Would be another precious Italy hit...
  • 216.105.98.145: montanismoaventura.com. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.146: large-format-news.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.147: nepalnewsbrief.com. Hit. dnshistory.org marks it as having IP 2010-03-10 -> 2010-08-15 216.169.148.94 [ref]. This range does feel a bit different from the others, too many broken archives, and relatively early ones too. Explored viewdns.info range: 216.169.148.84 - 216.169.148.104, empty for period.
  • 216.105.98.148: teclafinance.com. No archives. One wonders what "tecla" would have stood for. It is Portuguese for "keyboard key", but finance is English so.
  • 216.105.98.149: entreman.com: legit? web.archive.org/web/20110128212738/http://entreman.com/
  • 216.105.98.152: modernarabicnews.com. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.153: global-headlines.com. No archives of the period, then was a legitimate WordPress website for a while.
  • 216.105.98.154: everythingcricket.org. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.156: familyhealthonline.net. Hit.
  • 216.105.98.157: delacorne.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.158: econfutures.com. No archives.
  • 216.105.98.161: kstcloud.com. No archives.
219.90.61.123 journeystravelled.com Tested viewdns.info range: 219.90.61.100 - 219.90.61.133
  • 219.90.61.100: pressstory.com: "Under construction". web.archive.org/web/20110128124548/http://pressstory.com/
  • 219.90.61.103: bet2plays.com. "Under construction". Unlikely thematic, too spicy.
  • 219.90.61.110: surya-brahma.com. Hit
  • 219.90.61.111: classicalmusicboxonline.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.116: athletepro.net. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.117: lajornadanow.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.119: aviation-navigation.com. No archives.
  • 219.90.61.120: theinternationalworld.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.121: thepyramidnews.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.122: iran-newslink-today.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.61.123: journeystravelled.com. Hit.
219.90.62.243 fitness-dawg.com. whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-219-0-0-0-1/pft?s=219.90.62.243. Net Type: Allocated to APNIC. Tested viewdns.info range: unknown - 219.90.62.255
  • 219.90.62.173:
    • dominatingduos.com: 2013-08-12T17:53:09. No archive
    • has other domains
  • 219.90.62.193: centralnewsreleasers.com. Only a 2018 of the robots.txt: web.archive.org/web/*/http://centralnewsreleasers.com/* so likely not a hit
  • 219.90.62.209: penniesbythemillions.com. No archives.
  • 219.90.62.229: information-junky.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.231: todosperuahora.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.232: race26point2.com. Hit. No archives, but has subdomain: secure.race26point2.com, so likely CGI comms.
  • 219.90.62.233: theworld-news.net. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.234: recuerdosdeviajeonline.com. Hit
  • 219.90.62.235: ordenpolicial.com. No Wayback Machine archives. Last resolved: 2012-01-11.
  • 219.90.62.237: elcorreodenoticias.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.238: freshtechonline.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.240: cityworldnewsnow.com. Hit. No archives but has subdomain: secure.cityworldnewsnow.com so likely CGI comms.
  • 219.90.62.241: newscentertoday.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.242: ride-captain.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.244: easytraveleurope.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.245: world-news-now.net. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.246: negativeaperture.com. Hit.
  • 219.90.62.247: conquermstoday.com. Hit
  • 219.90.62.249: forensic-exchange.com. 2013 archive: web.archive.org/web/20130714094026/http://forensic-exchange.com/. Appears to be a buggy Wayback Machine archive somehow, so inconclusive.