Latest / The President's Daily Brief / PDB Afternoon Bulletin | September 23rd, 2026: Iran Directed the Houthi Offensive & Hackers Claim FBI Breach

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PDB Afternoon Bulletin | September 23rd, 2026: Iran Directed the Houthi Offensive & Hackers Claim FBI Breach · The President's Daily Brief

• 0:12
  It's Wednesday,
• 0:13
  the 23rd of September.
• 0:14
  Welcome to the PDB afternoon bulletin.
• 0:17
  I'm Mike Baker,
• 0:18
  your eyes and ears on the world stage.
• 0:20
  All right,
• 0:21
  let's get briefed.
• 0:22
  First up,
• 0:22
  the Houthis swept down Yemen's Red Sea coast in less than 48 hours.
• 0:27
  Now
• 0:28
  new reporting says Iranian Revolutionary Guard advisors
• 0:31
  were helping direct the offensive.
• 0:34
  Later in the show,
• 0:34
  a notorious hacking group claims that it
• 0:36
  breached the FBI and stole sensitive information
• 0:39
  on current and former bureau employees.
• 0:42
  But first,
• 0:43
  today's afternoon spotlight.
• 0:46
  Now if you're a regular PDB listener,
• 0:47
  and I certainly hope you are,
• 0:49
  this news will not surprise you.
• 0:51
  Iranian Revolutionary Guard advisors,
• 0:53
  the IRGC,
• 0:54
  were reportedly on the ground in Yemen
• 0:56
  helping direct the Houthi offensive that swept down
• 0:59
  the Red Sea coast earlier this month.
• 1:02
  According to a new investigation from the Associated Press,
• 1:06
  Iranian advisors helped plan tactical maneuvers,
• 1:09
  worked with frontline commanders,
• 1:11
  and assisted with communications and satellite intelligence
• 1:14
  as the Houthis advanced roughly 75 miles in less than 48 hours.
• 1:20
  One senior Houthi official told the AP that the Iranian advisors were
• 1:24
  present at all levels.
• 1:26
  Now Iranian support for the Houthis is obviously nothing new.
• 1:30
  Tehran has supplied the group with weapons and training,
• 1:33
  drones,
• 1:34
  missiles,
• 1:34
  and technical support for years.
• 1:36
  The AP says it spoke with 10 officials and soldiers
• 1:40
  while reconstructing the offensive,
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  including a senior Houthi official,
• 1:44
  regional officials,
• 1:45
  Yemeni military commanders,
• 1:47
  and a member of Yemen's ruling presidential council.
• 1:50
  Many of those sources spoke anonymously.
• 1:52
  Iran's mission to the UN
• 1:54
  did not respond to the AP's request for comment.
• 1:57
  Well,
• 1:57
  that's shocking.
• 1:58
  But if this reporting is accurate,
• 2:00
  it gives us our clearest picture yet of just how directly Iran was involved
• 2:05
  in one of the Houthis' most successful military operations in years,
• 2:09
  and it helps explain
• 2:11
  how that offensive moved so quickly.
• 2:13
  In less than 48 hours,
• 2:14
  the Houthis advanced roughly 75 miles
• 2:17
  along Yemen's Red Sea coast.
• 2:20
  They captured the port city of Mocha,
• 2:21
  seized strategic islands near the Bab al-Mendeb Strait,
• 2:25
  and sent Saudi-backed Yemeni forces into retreat.
• 2:28
  According to the AP,
• 2:29
  Iran had been steadily increasing its support well before the offensive began.
• 2:34
  Last year,
• 2:35
  Tehran reportedly expanded training and logistical assistance
• 2:39
  involving more advanced missiles,
• 2:40
  drones,
• 2:41
  and unmanned attack boats.
• 2:43
  Then in July something
• 2:46
  interesting happened.
• 2:47
  The Houthis accused Saudi Arabia of striking the airport in Sana'a
• 2:51
  in an apparent attempt to stop an incoming flight from Tehran.
• 2:54
  Now that aircraft eventually landed.
• 2:56
  According to the AP sources.
• 2:58
  It was carrying additional Revolutionary Guard advisors who joined other
• 3:02
  Iranian personnel and Hezbollah advisors already operating inside Yemen.
• 3:08
  Hezbollah,
• 3:08
  of course,
• 3:09
  is another Iranian proxy group.
• 3:11
  By early August,
• 3:12
  the Houthis were beginning to increase their attacks against government forces,
• 3:16
  and by September,
• 3:17
  the Iranian role had reportedly expanded significantly.
• 3:21
  That brings us to the battlefield.
• 3:23
  The strongest Saudi-backed force along the Red Sea coast
• 3:26
  was the National Resistance,
• 3:28
  which had roughly 30,000 fighters.
• 3:31
  Its spokesman says that in the month before the breakthrough,
• 3:33
  Houthi forces hit its position with
• 3:36
  130 ballistic missiles and 145 suicide drones.
• 3:41
  Those numbers have not been independently verified,
• 3:44
  but the more interesting part of the AP reporting involves intelligence.
• 3:48
  The Houthis apparently penetrated
• 3:49
  the national resistance's internal communications
• 3:52
  that reportedly allowed them to
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  monitor troop movements,
• 3:56
  follow conversations between commanders,
• 3:57
  and
• 3:58
  exploit confusion inside the Saudi-backed coalition.
• 4:02
  According to the reporting,
• 4:03
  Iranian advisors were helping
• 4:05
  analyze communications and satellite intelligence
• 4:08
  capabilities that the Houthis had previously lacked.
• 4:11
  At the same time,
• 4:12
  the forces opposing them were deeply divided.
• 4:15
  The national resistance and another major militia,
• 4:18
  the Giants Brigade,
• 4:19
  had a long running rivalry,
• 4:21
  and there was no unified command.
• 4:23
  When the Houthis broke through the mountains south
• 4:25
  toward Mocha on the 9th of September,
• 4:27
  those divisions became critical.
• 4:29
  The Houthis seized a strategic road and a nearby military base,
• 4:33
  cutting supply lines into the city.
• 4:35
  The head of the national resistance,
• 4:37
  Lieutenant General Tariq Saleh,
• 4:39
  fled and eventually took refuge in Saudi Arabia.
• 4:42
  And then came the collapse.
• 4:44
  Retreating troops began pouring back toward Mocha,
• 4:47
  and forces already stationed inside
• 4:49
  the city apparently interpreted that movement
• 4:52
  as a sign that a major Houthi assault was imminent.
• 4:55
  Panic spread.
• 4:56
  Thousands of civilians fled as well,
• 4:57
  and
• 4:58
  when Houthi forces entered Mocha early the next morning,
• 5:01
  the AP
• 5:02
  says that they encountered remarkably little resistance.
• 5:05
  One Houthi official described the city as essentially empty.
• 5:09
  Now there's another question hanging over all of this.
• 5:12
  Where were the Saudis?
• 5:14
  A senior Yemeni military official told the AP that government forces
• 5:17
  were stunned that Saudi aircraft did not strike the advancing Houthis.
• 5:22
  Saudi Arabia has not publicly explained why.
• 5:25
  Riyadh may have been reluctant to escalate further.
• 5:28
  The speed of the collapse may have caught commanders off guard.
• 5:31
  The fractured command structure among
• 5:33
  Yemeni forces may have complicated intervention
• 5:36
  at this stage.
• 5:37
  It's just not clear,
• 5:39
  but what we do know is the result.
• 5:42
  The Houthis now control a much larger stretch of Yemen's Red Sea coastline.
• 5:46
  They've captured weapons,
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  vehicles,
• 5:48
  and ammunition,
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  and they control strategic territory
• 5:51
  near one of the world's most important shipping lanes,
• 5:54
  and they did that with the direct support and guidance of the Iranian regime.
• 5:59
  All right.
• 5:59
  Next up,
• 6:00
  the FBI is investigating claims that hackers breached one of its systems and
• 6:04
  stole sensitive information on current and former employees.
• 6:08
  I'll be right back.
• 6:10
  Hey,
• 6:10
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• 8:38
  Welcome back to the PDB
• 8:39
  afternoon bulletin.
• 8:40
  A hacking group has released a sample of the data
• 8:43
  that it claims to have stolen from the FBI,
• 8:46
  including what appears to be agents' names,
• 8:48
  home addresses,
• 8:49
  and family members' names.
• 8:51
  The group calls itself Shiny Hunters.
• 8:53
  Well,
• 8:53
  that sounds jolly,
• 8:54
  and it claims those records are only a fraction of what it stole from the bureau.
• 8:58
  On Tuesday,
• 8:59
  the group claimed it had taken data on
• 9:01
  almost all FBI agents along with information on people who applied to work there.
• 9:07
  The group posted the claim on its dark
• 9:09
  website and gave Reuters what it described as a
• 9:12
  sample of records covering roughly 5000 agents.
• 9:16
  According to Shiny Hunters,
• 9:17
  that is only a small part of what it took from current
• 9:20
  and former Bureau employees.
• 9:23
  Before we get into how the hackers say they obtained those records,
• 9:26
  a quick note on who they are.
• 9:28
  Shiny hunters first emerged around 2020,
• 9:31
  though authorities now describe the group less as
• 9:33
  one centralized gang and
• 9:35
  more as a banner used by different cyber criminals.
• 9:38
  The name comes from Pokemon players.
• 9:40
  Oh,
• 9:40
  look,
• 9:41
  Pokemon,
• 9:41
  who hunt rare,
• 9:43
  shiny versions of the creatures.
• 9:45
  Pikachu.
• 9:46
  These hackers hunt something else large collections of personal and
• 9:49
  corporate data that can be sold or used for extortion.
• 9:53
  A French hacker linked to Shiny Hunters was sentenced
• 9:55
  to prison in the US back in 2024,
• 9:58
  but attacks claimed under the name continued.
• 10:01
  More recently,
• 10:01
  the group claimed a major theft involving Rockstar Games,
• 10:04
  that's the company behind Grand Theft Auto,
• 10:07
  and an attack on the academic platform Canvas that disrupted schools across the US
• 10:13
  So
• 10:13
  you ask,
• 10:14
  how does Shiny Hunter say that it got into the FBI?
• 10:17
  Well,
• 10:17
  according to reporting on the hacker's account,
• 10:19
  the group claims it first breached a system used for personnel and recruiting,
• 10:23
  then
• 10:24
  breached a government cloud system containing records on agents and applicants.
• 10:29
  The FBI has not confirmed either claim.
• 10:32
  The group also supplied what it said was
• 10:34
  a screenshot showing the FBI jobs website vandalized.
• 10:38
  Reuters could not authenticate that image,
• 10:40
  but a notice on the site Tuesday said both FBIjobs.gov
• 10:44
  and the Special Agent Applicant portal were unavailable.
• 10:48
  Then there's the sample data.
• 10:50
  Beyond names,
• 10:51
  addresses,
• 10:52
  and family details,
• 10:53
  the records appeared to contain Social Security numbers and agents' assignments.
• 10:58
  Reuters checked some of that information against
• 11:00
  credit bureau records and previously breached data
• 11:03
  in at least 10 cases,
• 11:05
  including one associated with FBI Director Kash Patel.
• 11:08
  Details appeared to match.
• 11:10
  A person familiar with the matter also told Reuters
• 11:13
  that some of the job descriptions appeared accurate,
• 11:16
  so some of the information may be legitimate.
• 11:18
  What we still don't know
• 11:20
  is where Shiny Hunters got the information from.
• 11:23
  Reuters could not establish that the records
• 11:24
  were stolen directly from internal FBI systems,
• 11:28
  nor could it confirm that the hackers possess anything
• 11:30
  close to the amount of data that they claim.
• 11:33
  The FBI says it's investigating unauthorized activity involving FBIjobs.gov.
• 11:38
  As for why Shiny Hunter says it targeted the bureau,
• 11:42
  well,
• 11:42
  the group claims that this was retaliation.
• 11:45
  In May,
• 11:45
  the FBI issued a warning describing Shiny Hunter's
• 11:48
  extortion tactics and advising victims not to pay.
• 11:52
  The hackers now say they want the bureau to withdraw that warning.
• 11:55
  The warning itself described a group willing to harass victims and their families
• 11:59
  to get what it wants,
• 12:01
  and that makes the information contained in this sample
• 12:04
  particularly troubling.
• 12:05
  If criminals can identify where an FBI agent lives,
• 12:08
  what that agent does,
• 12:09
  and who their relatives are,
• 12:11
  well,
• 12:11
  that creates obvious opportunities for intimidation,
• 12:15
  blackmail,
• 12:15
  or harassment.
• 12:17
  But the risk could go beyond cyber criminals.
• 12:20
  If this information is legitimate and begins circulating more widely,
• 12:23
  Foreign intelligence services,
• 12:25
  cartels,
• 12:25
  terrorist organizations,
• 12:27
  or organized crime groups
• 12:28
  could potentially use it to identify FBI personnel
• 12:32
  and map their relationships and assignments.
• 12:35
  Former FBI official Cynthia Kaiser told Reuters
• 12:37
  that information leaked nearly a decade ago
• 12:41
  is still used to harass agents today.
• 12:44
  Once information like this gets out,
• 12:45
  she warned,
• 12:46
  quote,
• 12:47
  It's used forever.
• 12:49
  And that,
• 12:50
  my friends,
• 12:50
  is the PDB afternoon bulletin for Wednesday,
• 12:52
  the 23rd of September.
• 12:54
  Now,
• 12:54
  if you have any questions or comments,
• 12:55
  and I hope you do,
• 12:56
  just reach out to me
• 12:57
  at PDB@tv.com.
• 13:00
  And to listen to the show ad-free where you can do that,
• 13:02
  it's very simple.
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  Just become a premium member of the President's Daily Brief
• 13:06
  by visiting PDBpremium.com.
• 13:08
  I'm Mike Baker and I'll be back tomorrow.
• 13:10
  Until then,
• 13:11
  stay informed,
• 13:12
  stay safe,
• 13:14
  stay cool.
• 13:29
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• 13:29
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• 13:30
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