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A Year's Further Research On an Espionage Network

Posted by kdawson on from the ghostnet's-successor dept.

Mortimer.CA writes "Last year researchers discovered a giant electronic spying operation they dubbed GhostNet. Now, after a further year's worth of research, Infowar Monitor has released a new report. The report (Scribbed PDF) documents a complex ecosystem of cyber espionage that systematically targeted and compromised computer systems in India, the Offices of the Dalai Lama, the United Nations, and several other countries. While the servers are in China, the report's authors say that there is 'no evidence in this report of the involvement of the People's Republic of China or any other government in the shadow network.' Furthermore, the 'intruders even stole documents related to the travel of NATO forces in Afghanistan, illustrating that even though the Indian government was the primary target of the attacks, one gap in computer security can leave many nations exposed.'"

4 of 61 comments (clear)

  1. Ooooh! The Dalai Lama! by oldspewey · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I continue to get a kick out of the Chinese government's fixation on the Dalai Lama. If the whole thing didn't involve the theft of a nation and the brutal repression of the Tibetan people, the situation would be hilarious in a Monthy Python sort of way.

    --
    If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
  2. Research 2.0 by Jazz-Masta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The team describes its findings in a report called Shadows in the Cloud: An investigation into Cyber Espionage 2.0

    Even "researchers" have caught the marketing bug. "Cloud" "Cyber" "2.0"

    Full report here:

    http://www.scribd.com/doc/29435784/SHADOWS-IN-THE-CLOUD-Investigating-Cyber-Espionage-2-0

  3. Let me refer all of you to this... by GPLDAN · · Score: 5, Informative

    The best bit of journalism in the last year on this subject:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/02/business/global/02hacker.html?emc=eta1

    Now - read the story of Maija the not-so-l33t hacker and pay special attention to how the story explains how the Chinese special intelligence services work. The whole thing is outsourced, loose affiliation. The blackwater-ization of hacking, where for the government is most interested in a plausible denial.

    Then tell me again how the Chinese intelligence services aren't funding and running Ghostnet.
    The way I see it, these hackers probably get treated as well as Bobby Kotick treats his people. Do thy bidding and get hookers sent over for lunch, maybe two if you find a 0-day.

  4. Re:and there is never a case of US involvement? by russotto · · Score: 4, Insightful

    so build into all US produced ( or at least with US label ) network devices a small Trojan Boot Loader hidden with dirty programming.

    It's plausible, but it's a works-once kind of thing. As soon as you make any major use of it, it's going to be found out, and everyone else is going to go looking for it. So you have to save it for when it's really valuable, but doing that means you risk it being found anyway and never using it.

    It['s

    And you end up with a fifth colon paid by the very IT user.

    What happened to colons two through four?