The Invasion of The Chinese Cyberspies

HorsesAss writes "Time Magazine has an article up entitled 'The Invasion Of The Chinese Cyberspies and the Man Who Tried to Stop Them', which outlines how Chinese PRC is cracking DOD networks and downloading massive sets of files detailing every aspect of military planning and practice." From the article: "The hackers he was stalking, part of a cyberespionage ring that federal investigators code-named Titan Rain, first caught Carpenter's eye a year earlier when he helped investigate a network break-in at Lockheed Martin in September 2003. A strikingly similar attack hit Sandia several months later, but it wasn't until Carpenter compared notes with a counterpart in Army cyberintelligence that he suspected the scope of the threat. Methodical and voracious, these hackers wanted all the files they could find, and they were getting them by penetrating secure computer networks at the country's most sensitive military bases, defense contractors and aerospace companies."

Comments

Uh...

[mcc]

They already did that

Re:Separate networks

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a gap between the 2. As far as I know, there has never been a hacking of a classified computer system in the DoD. The problem is that while single documents may be marked unclassified or for official use only, gathering a large number of those documents could actually be marked secret.

Air Gaps

[kcarlin]

Isn't this the reason that there is supposed to be an air gap between classified networks are and unclassified networks?

There are defense networks operating at all levels of security and a wide variety of restrictions. And some of the more interesting information that can be widely attained may have some element of inaccuracy associated with it.

While there is a basic approach established for each classification level, the security measures used for any given net can vary widely.

Think Spy vs. Spy in cyberspace.

By the way, air gaps are only good when combined with physical security and human engineering counter-measures. The security folks I've spoken to find human engineering is still the most common problem.

Re:Why doesn't the DOD just lock out all of China?

[YrWrstNtmr]

Is there a reason that they even bother accepting traffic from any where outside of the US?

Sure. Data sharing with allies, aircraft, ships, ground equipment is frequently designed/built elsewhere, and the myriad of US bases in other countries.

In addition, the 'compromised' systems are not actually DoD, but contractors. Boeing, LockMart, etc.

Lastly...if you read the article, no actual classified systems were compromised. OF course...gathering and putting together a lot of unclassified info can be quite bad.

Re:Just the Chinese?

[Samari711]

all of the best stuff is off the Internet, no doubt about it. There is still a lot of unclassified technology that the State Department doesn't want exported from the country though, and that's probably what's being stolen. It's usually stuff that is common in industry but can be used in certain circumstances for military purposes (i.e. encryption software). Boeing got fined pretty big not too long ago because a tiny chip in one of the comercial airplanes they sold to china could be used in missle guidance systems if oyu put enough together.

Re:Geopolitics of the next 100 years

[Liam Slider]

1. Taiwan is a small and culturally and economically insignificant island off the coast of a massive country. Almost everyone of economic significance in Taiwan is forging commercial links with the mainland. The mainland see it of minor importance, gaining points purely in chest beating; 300 years ago Chinese were a minority on the island, Ploynesians were the majority. It has zero cultural or economic significance for Chine.

Actually, Taiwan is fairly economically significant, regardless of it's small size. It has a GDP of $576.2 billion, and a per capita income of $25,300 (not great, but not exactly horrible either). It's an important international trade center as well.

2. China, unlike the US, has huge coal resources, which can provide the bulk of national power requirements for the next 30 years (providing the power plants and lines get put up).

Where do you get the idea that the US doesn't have lots of coal? Most of our electrical power comes from coal, and it's not imported, it's mined here. There are parts of this country where the entire economy depends on coal mining, as it's the major industry (certain areas of my own State for example) and a huge source of jobs. Heck, we export coal to other countries.