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China Crafts Cyberweapons
MitmWatcher writes to mention that a recent report by the Department of Defense revealed that China is continuing to build up their cyberwarfare units and develop viruses. "'The PLA has established information warfare units to develop viruses to attack enemy computer systems and networks,' the annual DOD report on China's military warned. At the same, Chinese armed forces are developing ways to protect its own systems from an enemy attack, it said, echoing similar warnings made in previous years."
Only sensible. News because they happen to be communist in name. Everyone else is doing the same things. This is like the revolutionary developments in bio-weapons by the major countries last century. China may actually have a better vision of the future in its defence policy than other nations.
The US will ignore this for the most part, keep trading with them, and allow corporations to send its citizens jobs to the nation that is attacking it. It makes me sick.
I like Linux as much as every other guy here but, if you actually believe that Linux is flawless enough to endure a military funded search for flaws and vulnerabilities and come out immaculate, you must be out of touch with reality.
If "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow", given enough eyeballs (and china has the most), money, military grade technology and bad intentions, every bugs is a potential weapon.
Not a change. China holds too much of our debt, and is too crucial for our economy. Also, China historically is mostly interested in China. Kinda makes for a poor enemy.
Beer is proof that God loves us, and wants us to be happy.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not bashing linux at all, but if my history serves me well here, linux gained a following among, shall we say, highly technical miscreants for a reason. It's powerful and able to be reconfigured to perform most any given task optimally.
Also, China historically is mostly interested in China.
Yes, but their definition of "China" includes Taiwan, Tibet, and the Spratly islands.
Every time you post an article on Slashdot, I kill a server. Think of the servers!
Honestly, I am so frustrated with this "its someone else's responsibility to make it work" and other finger pointing paradigms. Its MY stuff, I bought it with legal tender, and if I don't know how to maintain it, do I really have that much business having it?
If my dog made a mess, its obvious to me just what he did and where he did it. If termites made a mess, I can find and put back what they messed up. I feel exactly the same with my computing apparatus, and I highly resent efforts by others ( via DMCA like legal maneuvering ) to keep me ignorant of how my stuff works. It frustrates me to no end to have others make knowledge illegal, enforceable by police at gunpoint, only for the financial gain of blocking off alternative remedies I have for maintenance or customization needs.
Having ANY software vendor locking me in to their "support" is like having the contractor who built my house locking me in for anything I want to do to maintain or modify my house.
Not to say I would want to deprive him of his art of driving nails, but if he was too hard to get along with, or overprices himself, I strongly reserve what I feel is my right to pick up the hammer and saw and do it personally, if need be.
Ignorance is going to be the end of us (US).
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
I am pretty sure the following "news" could be read somewhen in China
"'The US has established information warfare units to develop viruses to attack enemy computer systems and networks,' the annual PLA Defense departement report on USA's military warned. At the same, US armed forces are developing ways to protect its own systems from an enemy attack, it said, echoing similar warnings made in previous years."
This leave me wondering with such a NON-news, what sort of propaganda is theUS trying to kick up. Are there commercial negociation starting soon with China ? Are they trying to put some pressure on China for a better rate ?
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I agree with what I think is your base point about China, but still, what about any of those places makes you think that the U.S. would be willing to risk having China stop financing our debt for any of them?
Besides that a couple of years ago China's political leadership and military leadership both told the press that if they DID go to war with the U.S. they would immediately resort to nuclear weapons, because they know they couldn't win conventionally.
No, even if that's all bluster, it's still too much risk (especially the debt financing) as long as they don't try and take OUR piece of the oil/diamonds/whatever economists say we need today. They won't, I think they are willing to share with the U.S. for now, and probably for the foreseeable future, barring something like peak oil being imminent or something. Maybe then, but that's probably not likely in the near future.
or off topic. When a country develops any sort of new military technology that creates increased competition with American military technology there is a political reappraisal. The dramatic example is nuclear technology, but many others exist. The parent poster is pointing out that these revelations of new military technology will not be handled with regard to China as they would with regard to many other nations.
His comment is not particularly insightful, but his assertions are defendable:
Slashdot has reported on attacks apparently coming from within China (titan rain), and attempts by China to disable U.S. spy sats (ground based laser something or other).
The U.S. government continues to grant China 'Favored Trade Nation' status and facilitate the offshoring of work... esecially in manufacturing despite continued resistance from China to enforce safety/humanitarian regulations in those industries (something we require from our other top trading partners, though not from the poorer ones).
The U.S. government continually ignores international organizations such as Amnesty International who attempt to open dialogue about human rights records.
So now China is creating systems designed to realign the BOP on the net. How will the U.S. react? If it's track record holds true, then the U.S. will not react... which is really puzzling. True, if we have it, then others should not be prohibited... but that is now how we treat the non-chinas of the world.
The only disputable or inflamatory statement made by parent is that he actually feels sick about this.
Regards.
Um. Ever wondered why Sun was still around? They make "Trusted Solaris". Any *important* computer systems already don't run windows.
Probably not viruses, but worms, and remote-root exploits. If your local equivalent of NSA or GCHQ has found a really nasty bug in, let us say, Apache, which allows root control of the server, they'll quietly code up a worm to exploit it, and keep it in storage against the day they decide they need to knock down a whole bunch of systems.
However, the potential economic gain from owning Apache / MySQL systems is far greater than from owning IIS / SQL Server systems. The reason Windows-based servers are more commonly attacked isn't because they're more numerous, it's because they're more vulnerable. That, and a vulnerability affecting one generally affects all. That's not always the case with the more varied Linux systems, where exploits often depend on a very specific combination of software. So, if you're truly paranoid about informational attack, make sure your crucial systems are as secure as possible, and also varied in configuration, so that no single attack can take out all of them.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Are we assuming that our military isn't attacking them, too? It just seems like standard operating procedure to me.
This is one of those irregular verbs:
By developing cyber weapons, US is defending freedom everywhere.
By developing cyber defenses, China is destablising the world.
By having computers, Iran is sponsoring terrorism.
To be serious about it, how can anyone be surprised that a major country is concerned about cyber-security?
of course this makes sense now, get the Microsoft windows source code, encourage your citizens to use Red Flag Linux instead, gain a competitive edge when cyber-warefare erupts.
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