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Pentagon Discloses Network Breach By Russian Hackers
An anonymous reader writes: The Pentagon has disclosed that Russian hackers were able to breach one of its secure networks earlier this year, and referred to the attack as a "worrisome" incident. "Earlier this year, the sensors that guard DOD's unclassified networks detected Russian hackers accessing one of our networks," said defense secretary Ash Carter yesterday during a speech at Stanford University. Carter warned Russia that the U.S. Department of Defense would retaliate with cyber campaigns should it see fit. "Adversaries should know that our preference for deterrence and our defensive posture don't diminish our willingness to use cyber options if necessary," said Carter. He added in a prepared statement that the Russian hackers had been able to gain access to an "unclassified network" but had been "quickly identified" by a team of cyberattack experts who managed to block the hackers "within 24 hours." The cybersecurity response team had quickly analyzed the hack patterns and code and identified the intruders as Russian, before "kicking them off the network."
It isn't what you think - as an isolated network.
There are thousands of connections between the secure net and the unclassified network due to the amount of data that must be transferred. Even where I worked 20 years ago, the amount of data being transferred by tapes was many GB per hour - and tape handling was too slow to keep up.
And the summary is incorrect. The penetration was of an unclassified network. From the article itself:
"The United States on Thursday disclosed a cyber intrusion this year by Russian hackers who accessed an unclassified U.S. military network, in a episode Defense Secretary Ash Carter said showed the growing threat and the improving U.S. ability to respond."
The fact that my network is seeing a 10 fold increased attacks from Russian IP's over the past 2-3 years is enough to lead me to believe what's being said here is true. Still doesn't beat China but Russia is very quickly gaining ground.