It's Wednesday, the 23rd of September. Welcome to the PDB afternoon bulletin. I'm Mike Baker from your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, the hooties swept down Yemen's Red Sea coast in less than 48 hours. Now, new reporting says Iranian Revolutionary Guard advisors were helping direct the offensive. Later in the show, a notorious hacking group claims that it breached the FBI and stole sensitive information on current and former bureau employees. But first, today's afternoon spotlight. Now, if you're a regular PDB listener, and I certainly hope you are, this news will not surprise you. Iranian Revolutionary Guard advisors, the IRGC, were reportedly on the ground in Yemen, helping direct the hootie offensive that swept down the Red Sea coast earlier this month. According to a new investigation from the Associated Press, Iranian advisors helped plan tactical maneuvers, worked with frontline commanders, and assisted with communications and satellite intelligence as the hooties advanced roughly 75 miles in less than 48 hours. When senior hootie officials told the AP that the Iranian advisors were, quote, "present at all levels." Now, Iranian support for the hooties is obviously nothing new. Tehran is supplied the group with weapons and training, drones, missiles, and technical support for years. The AP, says it spoke with 10 officials and soldiers, or reconstructing the offensive, including a senior hootie official, regional officials, Yemeni military commanders, and a member of Yemen's ruling presidential council. Many of those sources spoke anonymously. Iran's mission to the UN did not respond to the AP's request for comment while that's shocking. But if this reporting is accurate, it gives us our clearest picture yet of just how directly Iran was involved in one of the hooties' most successful military operations in years, and it helps explain how that offensive moves so quickly. In less than 48 hours, the hooties advanced roughly 75 miles along Yemen's Red Sea coast. They captured the port city of Mokha seized strategic islands near the Babelman-Debstrate, and sent Saudi-back Yemeni forces into retreat. According to the AP, Iran had been steadily increasing its support well before the offensive began. Last year, Tehran reportedly expanded training and logistical assistance, involving more advanced missiles, drones, and unmanned attack boats. Then, in July, something interesting happened. The hooties accused Saudi Arabia of striking the airport in Sana'a in an apparent attempt to stop an incoming flight from Tehran. Now that aircraft eventually landed, according to the AP's sources, it was carrying additional revolutionary guard advisers who joined other Iranian personnel and Hezbollah advisers, already operating inside Yemen. Hezbollah, of course, is another Iranian proxy group. By early August, the hooties were beginning to increase their attacks against government forces, and by September, the Iranian roll had reportedly expanded significantly. That brings us to the battlefield. The strongest Saudi-backed force along the Red Sea coast was the national resistance, which had roughly 30,000 fighters. It spokesman says that, in the month before the breakthrough, Hootie forces hid its position with 130 ballistic missiles and 145 suicide drones. Those numbers have not been independently verified. But the more interesting part of the AP reporting involves intelligence. The hooties apparently penetrated the national resistance's internal communications. That reportedly allowed them to monitor troop movements, follow conversations between commanders and exploit confusion inside the Saudi-back coalition. According to the reporting, Iranian advisers were helping analyze communications and satellite intelligence, capabilities that the hooties had previously lacked. At the same time, the forces opposing them were deeply divided. The national resistance, and another major militia, the Giants Brigade, had a long-running rivalry, and there was no unified command. When the hooties broke through the mountains south toward Mocha on the 9th of September, those divisions became critical. The hooties seized a strategic road and a nearby military base, cutting supply lines into the city. The head of the national resistance, Lieutenant General Tariq Saleh, fled and eventually took refuge in Saudi Arabia. And then came the collapse. Retreating troops began pouring back toward Mocha, and forces already stationed inside the city apparently interpreted that movement as a sign that a major hootie assault was imminent. Panic spread, thousands of civilians fled as well, and when hootie forces entered Mocha early the next morning, the AP says that they encountered remarkably little resistance. One hootie official described the city as essentially empty. Now there's another question hanging over all of this. Where were the Saudis? A senior Yemeni military official told the AP that government forces were stunned that Saudi aircraft did not strike the advancing hooties. Saudi Arabia has not publicly explained why. Riyadh may have been reluctant to escalate further. The speed of the collapse may have caught commanders off guard. The fractured command structure among Yemeni forces may have complicated intervention. At this stage, it's just not clear. But what we do know is the result. The hooties now control a much larger stretch of Yemen's Red Sea coastline. They've captured weapons, vehicles and ammunition, and they control strategic territory near one of the world's most important shipping lanes. And they did that with the direct support and guidance of the Iranian regime. Next up, the FBI is investigating claims that hackers breached one of its systems and stole sensitive information on current and former employees. I'll be right back. Hey, Mike Baker here with an important health tip. Look now that summer is over. I know I'm sorry about that bad news. Daily schedules are getting crazier, right? With earlier alarms, school activities, busier days, you know what I'm talking about. And when life gets more chaotic, the problem is, well, it's easy to start compromising on your good health routine. For me, I do not want to compromise on my health routine. I'm talking regular exercise, good nutrition, and AG1. 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A hacking group has released a sample of the data that it claims to have stolen from the FBI, including what appears to be agent's names, home addresses, and family members' names. The group calls itself shiny hunters, well, that sounds jolly, and it claims those records are only a fraction of what it stole from the Bureau. On Tuesday, the group claimed that it had taken data on, quote, "almost all FBI agents," along with information on people who applied to work there. The group posted the claim on its dark website, and gave Reuters what it described as a sample of records covering roughly 5,000 agents. According to shiny hunters, that is only a small part of what it took from current and former Bureau employees. Before we get into how the hackers say they obtained those records, a quick note on who they are. Shiny hunters first emerged around 2020, though authorities now describe the group less as one centralized gang and more as a banner used by different cyber criminals. The name comes from Pokemon players, "Oh look, Pokemon," who rare, quote, "shiny versions of the creatures," hmm, Pikachu. These hackers hunt something else, large collections of personal and corporate data that can be sold or used for extortion. A French hacker linked to shiny hunters was sentenced to prison in the US back in 2024, but attacks claimed out of the name continue.
continued. More recently, the group claimed a major theft involving rockstar games, that's the company behind Grand Theft Auto, and an attack on the academic platform Canvas that disrupted schools across the US. So, you ask, how does shiny hunters say that it got into the FBI? Well, according to reporting on the hackers account, the group claims it first breached a system used for personnel and recruiting, then reached a government cloud system containing records on agents and applicants. The FBI has not confirmed either claim. The group also supplied what it said was a screen shut, showing the FBI jobs website vandalized. Reuters could not authenticate that image, but a notice on the site Tuesday said both FBI jobs.gov and the special agent applicant portal were unavailable. Then there's the sample data. Beyond names, addresses, and family details, the records appeared to contain social security numbers and agents assignments. Reuters checked some of that information against credit bureau records and previously breached data, in at least 10 cases, including one associated with FBI Director Cash Patel, details appeared to match. A person familiar with the matter also told Reuters that some of the job descriptions appeared accurate. So, some of the information may be legitimate. What we still don't know is where shiny hunters got the information from. Reuters could not establish that the records were stolen directly from internal FBI systems, nor could it confirm that the hackers possess anything close to the amount of data that they claim. The FBI says it's investigating an authorized activity involving FBI jobs.gov. As for why, shiny hunters says it targeted the bureau, other group claims that this was retaliation. In May, the FBI issued a warning describing shiny hunters' extortion tactics and advising victims not to pay. The hackers now say they want the bureau to withdraw that warning. The warning itself described a group willing to harass victims and their families to get what it wants. And that makes the information contained in this sample particularly troubling. If criminals can identify where an FBI agent lives, what that agent does and who their relatives are, or that creates obvious opportunities for intimidation, blackmail, or an harassment. But the risk could go beyond cybercriminals. If this information is legitimate and begins circulating more widely, foreign intelligence services, cartels, terrorist organizations, or organized crime groups could potentially use it to identify FBI personnel and map their relationships and assignments. Former FBI officials Cynthia Kaiser told Reuters that information leaked nearly a decade ago is still used to harass agents today. Once information like this gets out, she warned, quote, "Hits Used Forever." And that, my friends, is the PDB after an embolden for Wednesday, the 23rd of September. Now, if you have any questions or comments and I hope you do, just reach out to me at
[email protected]. And to listen to the show, add free, where you can do that, it's very simple. Just become a premium member of the President's Daily Brief by visiting PDBpremium.com. I'm Mike Baker and I'll be back tomorrow until then, stay informed, stay safe, stay cool. Hey, Mike Baker here. Now, we've all heard those radio ads about the IRS, right? You know what I'm talking about. They tell you to be afraid, be very afraid, and they try to frighten you into calling. Well, tax relief advocates is different. TRA, if you owe money to the IRS, whether it's $5,000 or $50,000 or $500,000, TRA has a solution to your tax problem. Don't lose hope. TRA could reduce or even eliminate what you owe to the IRS. Their passion is taxes and helping individuals and businesses fix their IRS problems. They've got over 1,000 five-star Google reviews and an A+ with a better business bureau. Here's the thing. You do not need to be afraid of the IRS any longer. Generous tax relief programs are now available that can give you a fresh start, so don't wait. Simply visit tra.com. That's tra.com or call the number 800-583-6515. Once again, that number 800-583-6515. Tax relief advocates, real solutions for real people.
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