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U.S. Calls On China To End Hacking; Start Cyberspace Dialogue

New submitter trickymyth writes "For the first time, the United States has mentioned the People's Republic of China in relation to cyber crime, officially acknowledging what has been long suspected by private security experts and the U.S. business community. The Obama Administration seeks to get the Chinese government to acknowledge the problem, to cease any state-sponsored hacker activity, and to start a dialogue on normative behavior on the internet. This announcement follows the recent 60-page report from the American cybersecurity firm Mandiant, who spent two years compiling evidence against the so-called 'Comment Crew.' They traced IP addresses, common behavior, and tools to track the group's activity, which led to a Shanghai neighborhood home to the People's Liberation Army (PLA's) Unit 61398. This tracking came at the behest of the Times, who has experienced some trouble with hacking in the past. The Chinese government rejected the report as 'unprofessional' and 'lacking technical evidence.' This announcement also comes amid a delicate leadership transition in China and numerous new reports on the vulnerability of U.S. business and government networks to attack."

31 of 160 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah they'll get right on that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This is the same country they has a national firewall infrastructure to use against its own citzens. I'm sure their morals will guide them right when it comes to using hacking as a weapon of war.

  2. Good Luck With That by Farmer+Pete · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I hope this ends well, but I have a feeling that either nothing will come out of this, or the Chinese will ramp up efforts since they don't have to worry about hiding their efforts.

    1. Re:Good Luck With That by Synerg1y · · Score: 4, Funny

      Cyber war = rise of the nerds?

    2. Re:Good Luck With That by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 5, Funny

      Cyber war = rise of the nerds?

      In case of Chinese government-fed hackers, it's rice of the nerds.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
  3. Re:Crybabies by lesincompetent · · Score: 2

    The whole foreign policy of the USA in a nutshell.

  4. But Stuxnet was ok, eh? by A+nonymous+Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's ok for the US but no one else?

    Guess some left hand isn't talking to the right hand.

  5. I have a cheap solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Silly Times, if you are scared of the Chinese hackers, you can just insert this code at the top of your site:

    < h1 > tiananmen square < /h1 >

  6. It will fade away by Spy+Handler · · Score: 5, Interesting

    China is about to have an epic crash when their real estate bubble bursts:

    60 minutes on China Real Estate Bubble

    When that happens, their economy will tank... similar to what happened in U.S. in 2008. And that will bring out people demonstrating in the streets. The Chinese security apparatus will have its hands full trying to stifle online dissent and stop people from plotting against the government. Cyber attacks on external targets will fade.

    1. Re:It will fade away by ljw1004 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      China is about to have an epic crash when their real estate bubble bursts

      A different view, published a week after your CBSNews report:
      http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2013/03/11/chinas-non-bubble-housing-bubble/

      "By comparison, China’s housing bubble is a non-bubble... There’s also nothing close to a mortgage backed securities bubble and no sub-prime lending...'You don’t see the same amount of bank stress that you see in the U.S. because the debt levels are significantly lower, both for the builders and for the buyers'."

    2. Re:It will fade away by Spy+Handler · · Score: 3, Insightful

      that's true, China doesn't have the mortgage-backed securities and subprime lending we saw in the U.S.

      But while those things certainly help fan a bubble, you can still have a bubble without them. There was no subprime lending or Tulip-backed securities, yet the Tulip bubble still took place.

  7. Re:Agreed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    yep, because there's no way sending a remote controlled robot after a team of hackers could go wrong.

  8. JFK by nikros · · Score: 2

    I believe we possess all the resources and talents necessary. But the facts of the matter are that we have never made the national decisions or marshaled the national resources required for such leadership. We have never specified long-range goals on an urgent time schedule, or managed our resources and our time so as to insure their fulfillment. JFK 1961 ppl who who don't know history are doomed to repeat it

  9. Re:"Normative behavior" by daremonai · · Score: 4, Informative

    Um, the "firewall" in China is mostly to keep Chinese from getting out, not others from getting in. I assure you, systems in China are hacked all the time. Mostly for things like botnet recruitment, of course.

  10. Re:Agreed by c0lo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    the U.S. WILL go in and do what is in their best interest.

    I don't know why I have a feeling that US'es best interest is to fix their security flaws. Otherwise... what, will you do the same when e.g. Belarus (as a country) or a group of Russian hackers (acting "in private name") decides they'd like to test US tubez?
    Or is one of your kinky pleasures to pay taxes that will end into the bank accounts of the "defense industry"?

    --
    Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
  11. Re:Mr President by Looker_Device · · Score: 3, Funny

    No women! They'll destroy the purity and essence of our natural fluids!

    --
    Your political party doesn't care about your rights and only represents corporate interests.
  12. Re:Mr President by X0563511 · · Score: 4, Informative

    You are not funny.

    --
    For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
  13. Corrollory to Betteridge's Law by rhysweatherley · · Score: 5, Funny

    Any headline where the US is demanding that some other country stop doing something can be simply answered with "You First Sparky!".

  14. "How about we call it a draw?" by jfengel · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Seems to me that this is like asking for a truce when we're losing. They've got no reason to say yes.

    Fortunately, this isn't a battle we have to lose. Yeah, I think we have to admit that every grandma-box running Windows 98 is going to be a spam-spewing zombie for the foreseeable future, but the corporations that make the juiciest targets should also be capable of at least some self-defense. If thy IP block offends thee, cut it off. Social engineering is always going to trump user education, but we can at least make it an arms race.

    At least it's not nukes, which are harder to walk away from. That means we also don't have Mutually Assured Destruction. They're going to do it even if they sign a treaty saying that they won't, so we're going to have to hunker down and deal. Asking them to call it a draw isn't going to get us anywhere.

    1. Re:"How about we call it a draw?" by lennier · · Score: 2

      but the corporations that make the juiciest targets should also be capable of at least some self-defense.

      You might think that, but apparently no. For example, here's this January 2013 report from the Defense Science Board, which I'm surprised hasn't made it to Slashdot yet. It's very sad and sobering reading.

      After several months of researching best practices of cyber metrics in commercial, academia and government spaces, the Task Force determined that no metrics are currently available to directly determine or predict the cyber security or resilience of a given system. .... Even knowing if a system is compromised is very difficult. ...
      In the process of conducting this study, it became apparent that the full spectrum cyber threat represented by a Tier V-VI capability is of such magnitude and sophistication that it could not be defended against. ...
      Organizations in the Department today, however, do not generally share details about cyber attacks that have compromised their systems. Instead, system compromises are often classified, keeping people in the dark who must be aware so they can anticipate similar attacks. Consequently, DoD organizations are trying to field defenses based only on partial knowledge of what kind of vulnerabilities are being exploited. ...
      For more than 15 years, the Department has invested significant resources (people and funding) in an effort to prevent, detect and respond to a full range of cyber threats. ... Strong authentication based on the Common Access Card (CAC) and Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) capabilities and other Defense in Depth mechanisms added to the overall “assurance” of the networks. Then, based on a significant infection of the Unclassified but Sensitive Internet Protocol (IP) Router Network (NIPRNet) and the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet) in 2008, deployment of additional technologies, e.g., Host Based Security System (HBSS) and other hardening and situational awareness tools were accelerated.

      While well-intentioned and strongly supported, these and subsequent initiatives have not had the desired impact on the overall IA posture of the Department. Defensive measures implemented at the boundaries between the NIPRNet and the Internet proved to be only marginally effective in blocking successful intrusions or reducing the overall attack surface of DoD networks and systems. Mobile platforms (smart phones, tablets, etc.) exacerbate this already challenging problem. Red teams, conducting operations during military exercises or at the request of Military Department and Agency officials, continue to have a nearly perfect success rate breaking into the systems.

      Within classified networks, once thought to be safe for military command and control traffic, our adversary has successfully penetrated vulnerabilities created by poor user practices and a lack of discipline at all levels of the command structure. Operation BUCKSHOT YANKEE was clearly a wake-up call, suggesting that every system relied on for the conduct of war fighting operations is at risk of exploitation by an increasingly sophisticated adversary; an adversary ready and able to exploit any technical or human weakness to achieve their objectives.

      Emphasis mine, but this is scary stuff. Even the classified US military IP networks have lousy security and have been infected by viruses.

      I've never seen this announced before, but it's basically game over for network defense. The DoD can't keep their boxes patched. That's why they're talking about offensive cyber and nuclear first strike.

      --
      You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
  15. Re:Crybabies by gmuslera · · Score: 2

    Wrong analogy. This one is "you don't attack us, and we keep attacking you", or maybe "my data is only mine, and your data is ours". Or even maybe "you stop your attacks, and we jail our hackers" (and those "hackers" are the ones that hack against us, not for us, be pirates, people that fight for people rights, or whoever disclose government/corporations abuses)

  16. Re:Imagine it's 2003 by NoKaOi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Imagine it's 2003, and Slashdot has an article about the widely criticized Iraqi invasion. An American makes a post just like yours:

    "But invading Kuwait was ok, huh?"

    Would you have embraced that sentiment? Would the moderators have modded it up?
    I imagine that poster would be flooded with indignant replies containing variations of "two wrongs don't make a right"

    Now imagine again that it's 2003. We know that North Korea is close to getting nukes, and their leader is literally insane. Far away, we have a bit of unreliable intelligence from some dude that was tortured and told us Saddam had WMDs, that we know is unreliable (because the guys that tortured him and told us about it also told us that it was unreliable). We also know that even if these WMDs do exist, they are not nukes. Also, unlike North Korea, Saddam was a major asshole but was not actually literally insane (at least not more than any other asshole politician). We know that if we take Saddam's regime out, we'll have to be there for a very, very long time to prevent an even bigger asshole from taking over. Meanwhile, our friends in South Korea would be happy to take over North Korea if we took out Kim Jong-Il's regime, and unite North and South Korea, significantly helping the entire population of North Korea.

    10 Years prior, your daddy (president at that time) and your current VP (Secretary of Defense at that time) had both said invading Iraq to go after Saddam would have been obviously stupid. Your current VP even explained why it would be utterly stupid in an interview with C-SPAN in 1994.

    Which country do you invade?

  17. Re:Alternative solutions by invid · · Score: 2

    The internet, just by being the internet, is far more damaging to China than Chinese hackers are to the Unites States.

    --
    The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
  18. Re:Agreed by lennier · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know why I have a feeling that US'es best interest is to fix their security flaws.

    Fix... the flaws? But... that would be like... shipping products which were warranted to be of merchantable fitness! It would require mandatory code regression analysis and testing which might cost money and would certainly create jobs! You're asking the software industry to submit to invasive scrutiny from the same kind of Government jackboots that the food, banking and building industries now tremble under daily! And that's socialism.

    The only thing that can stop a black hat with a rootkit is a white hat with a rootkit!
    If you outlaw shoddy, worthless software containing a million zero-day exploits, only outlaws will be exploited!
    You'll take my imperative thread-based unsafe self-modifying code from my cold dead FATAL EXCEPTION AT 00FE:4358 SYSTEM HALTED!

    In conclusion, I support Mom, apple pie, and an American software developer's inalienable right to immediately patent and ship whatever string of line noise can be coerced to come out the other end of a rusty, sawn-off C++ compiler, and my esteemed opponent does not.

    I know I can trust you all to vote with your hearts.

    --
    You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
  19. Welcome to the party, pal. by lexsird · · Score: 2

    China has been hacking US gamers for years. I get notifications from Guild Wars 2 that someone in China tried to access my account, please change my password. Welcome to the world wide web, Mr President and Congress, we need smarter policies, not more neolithic special interests pandering bullshit. Set up a firewall that you can monitor the hits on it, you will find that China is a beehive of hacker activity.

    We do have people highly qualified and capable of not only securing our country's systems, but being our scalpel as well. Let's not panic for fuck's sake.

    --
    Take the Red Pill.
  20. Re:Yes by Mister+Liberty · · Score: 2

    The Middle East itself disagrees with you.

  21. Re:"Normative behavior" by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 5, Funny

    "We are not hacking. Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time."

    (Guard 2 whispers): "Are they leaving?"

    "I told them we weren't hacking." (Both snicker.)

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  22. Or what... by detritus. · · Score: 2

    Issue sanctions? Stop it, it hurts to laugh.

  23. Won't work by dutchwhizzman · · Score: 2

    Blocking overseas network traffic will just mean that the hackers will start using US based places to start hacking from. Just blocking China won't work since the hackers almost exclusively use intermediate (hacked) computers that are not in China to do their stuff from. The fact that China isn't really hiding their economic hacking doesn't mean that other countries aren't doing just that as well. Don't forget that commerce and government are more or less the same in "communist" China. This is nothing but industrial espionage, which takes place everywhere, not just in China-USA. The real difference is that in this case the owners of the industry aren't people claiming to be private citizens in a claimed democracy. You're basically fighting a very powerful economy that happens to be a lot more efficient at their corruption than the the US economy is, with the exception of the arms industry.

    --
    I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
  24. Re:Yes by Uberbah · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Call me hypocritical

    Okay. You're a hypocrite.

    but preventing Iran from having a nuclear bomb

    Iran has no nuclear weapons program.

    for the safety of the middle eastern region (and global security) is definitely worthwhile.

    So when are you going to invade Israel to dispossess them of their ~200 nuclear weapons?

    U.S. and Israeli bitching about Iran is like Biff Tannen bitching that Stephen Hawking has made a retaliatory threat to run over Biff's toes with a wheelchair if Biff attacks him first.

  25. Silly to even try by WindBourne · · Score: 2

    China ignores all their treaties. For example, they recently joined the UN in condemning NK and promising that they would stop NK's slush fund if found. OK. So, America obviously KNEW where it was and points it out. What does China do? Nothing.
    Then you have their treaty with USA and WTO. They were required to drop most of their tariffs (around 90 at the time), no subsidies for exported goods, no dumping of exported goods, and free their money. Instead, they now have over 400 tariffs, subsidize many key items, are constantly dumping in foreign nations, and manipulate their money.
    Likewise, they have a treaty with Japan that requires them to have pollution control on all new cement and coal plants. Sadly, the Japanese made a mistake in not requiring them to turn on the controls. As such, China simply turns off the controls most of the time. They only turn it on when Chinese gov. tells that they must and for how long (typically a special event or somebody coming to check the environment).

    And now somebody thinks that CHina will keep their word? Not a chance.

    --
    I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
  26. You tried. by zyphyrus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So what incentives exactly does China have to stop hacking? Stop a cyber war? Their hackers are better than yours. Afraid after sanctions? It's unlikely enough countries would be willing to stop trading. Best thing to do imo is to upgrade US's digital infrastructure. Solve the root of the problem.