Hackers are Attacking Sochi Visitors' Electronics Within Minutes of Being Powered Up

It seems that before you can even remove your finger from the power button, your smartphone, tablet or computer has already been hacked if you’re attending the Olympic Games in Sochi.

According to a news report that recently aired on NBC, Russian hackers are attacking Olympic visitors’ computers and phones the instant they turn them on. This is being looked at as the way things have been going for what is being called the broken $51 billion event.

You would think that NBC reporter Richard Engel, who I usually see coving war-torn areas, would have an easier assignment in Sochi. After all, he is at the Olympic Games, but this doesn’t seem to be the case.

Engel worked together with a security expert to see just what would happen to their computers. They set up two test computers with the objective of seeing how long it would take the Russian hackers to break into them.

The test computers were set up in a cafe in order to log onto the Russian network. Engel reported that "before we even finished our coffee" the bad actors had hit, downloading malware and "stealing my information and giving hackers the option to tap or even record my phone calls."

These hackers worked as fast as lightning. As soon as the computers made a connection to the Internet, they were hacked. Engel said. It took "less than one minute [for hackers] to pounce, and in less than 24 hours, they had broken into both of my computers."

The U.S. State Department is warning visitors to Russia. It has told Americans who are going to Sochi that they should have “no expectation of privacy,” even in their hotel rooms, which apparently have a whole slew of problems of their own. “And as we found out, you are especially exposed as soon as you try to communicate with anything. One of the first thing visitors to Russia will do is log on,” Engel said.

You know how true Engel’s statement is. As soon as the plane lands, everyone will turn on their phones and most likely their tablets as well and at that point, to start getting information. By then it is already too late. Instead of gathering any information, they will be giving up all of their data.

NBC’s news anchor, Brian Williams said, “As tourists and families of athletes arrive in Sochi, if they haven’t been warned, and if they fire up their phones at baggage claim, it’s probably too late to save the integrity of their electronics and everything inside them. Visitors to Russia can expect to be hacked. And as Richard Engel found out upon his arrival there, it’s not a matter of if, but when.”