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North Korean Hackers Are Targeting US Defense Contractors (wpengine.com)
chicksdaddy quotes Security Ledger:
North Korean hackers have stepped up their attacks on U.S. defense contractors in an apparent effort to gain intelligence on weapon systems and other assets that might be used against the country in an armed conflict with the United States and its allies, The Security Ledger is reporting. Security experts and defense industry personnel interviewed by The Security Ledger say that probes and attacks by hacking groups known to be associated with the government of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) have increased markedly as hostilities between that country and the United States have ratcheted up in the last year. The hacking attempts seem to be aimed at gaining access to intellectual property belonging to the companies, including weapons systems deployed on the Korean peninsula.
"As the situation between the DPRK and the US has become more tense, we've definitely seen an increase in number of probe attempts from cyber actors coming out of the DPRK," an official at an aerospace and defense firm told Security Ledger. The so-called "probes" were targeting the company's administrative network and included spear phishing attacks via email and other channels. The goal was to compromise computers on the corporate network... So far, the attacks have targeted "weakest links" within the firms, such as Human Resources personnel and general inquiry mailboxes, rather than targeting technical staff directly. However, experts who follow the DPRK's fast evolving cyber capabilities say that the country may have more up their sleeve.
CNBC also reports that America's congressional defense committees have authorized a last-minute request for $4 billion in extra spending for "urgent missile defeat and defense enhancements to counter the threat of North Korea."
Other countries newly interested in purchasing missile defense systems include Japan, Sweden, Poland, and Saudi Arabia.
"As the situation between the DPRK and the US has become more tense, we've definitely seen an increase in number of probe attempts from cyber actors coming out of the DPRK," an official at an aerospace and defense firm told Security Ledger. The so-called "probes" were targeting the company's administrative network and included spear phishing attacks via email and other channels. The goal was to compromise computers on the corporate network... So far, the attacks have targeted "weakest links" within the firms, such as Human Resources personnel and general inquiry mailboxes, rather than targeting technical staff directly. However, experts who follow the DPRK's fast evolving cyber capabilities say that the country may have more up their sleeve.
CNBC also reports that America's congressional defense committees have authorized a last-minute request for $4 billion in extra spending for "urgent missile defeat and defense enhancements to counter the threat of North Korea."
Other countries newly interested in purchasing missile defense systems include Japan, Sweden, Poland, and Saudi Arabia.
Filled with anti-NK propaganda, in the Korean language.
Our good friends in Russia are still doing lots of business with North Korea.
Donald, they're laughing at you, not with you.
https://www.theatlantic.com/in...
You are welcome on my lawn.
But this is a technical blog
of course they are. It would be silly if they weren't. Hell, I'm sure our allies are targeting us and we're targeting them. That's just the nature of these things. The fact that we can read stories about it means NK isn't very good at it.
Now, watch the news. If you start seeing more and more of these kind of stories about scary things NK is doing that's when you start worrying, because it means our media is gearing us up for war with them. Go look back at media coverage before Iraq/Afghanistan if you doubt me.
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NK has a bunch of hackers, did anyone expect them to twiddle their thumbs and just sat there doing nothing? Of course they would try to hack and steal secrets! Then of course US military would be one of the targets!
There is nothing newsworthy about this. Any sane person would also expect the CIA and NSA to be hacking any NK military server they can reach. They would be negligent in their duties if they were not doing that.
It would be newsworthy if they said the NK hackers trying to get into Alibaba servers instead.
that shit don't need to be there, for fucking ducks' sake.
"I could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot someone, and people would still vote for me."
Yes, dear Trump supporter, you're a fucking moron. Even Trump himself thinks you're a fucking moron, and he was right, because he told you to your face, and you still voted for him.
So why should anyone take seriously anything that comes out of this stupid, worthless, moronic, retarded parody of a brain of yours ?
Since the USA has enough military capability to "nuke the site from orbit, just to be sure", several times over, this seems like a wasted effort.
Do you care exactly how many megatons of nuclear warheads were used to eradicate you? Is this so NK can know exactly how much overkill the USA could bring to bear if they wished to do so?
Honestly, everybody involved knows the standoff is dependent on China and Russia as well as having Seoul within shelling range... almost nothing about the precise American capabilities matters.
The minute NK threatened the use of an electromagnetic pulse weapon the U.S. should have dropped the hammer. You can't have an unstable communist dictator talking that way. It's going way beyond any acceptable line.
Why have sensitive mil and contractor data in plain text on random internet facing networks?
What is US counterintelligence doing?
Watch the contractor network and use lots of encryption. Compartmentalize projects and data. Just in time from just about any company is not secure.
The next question for the USA is the quality of its mil, gov and contractor human security.
Who is around your bases, ports offering mil/contractors pleasure, alcoholic beverages and cash for US secrets?
Start doing interviews and background reports on all mil officials and contractors.
Look for new wealth, holidays, police reports of loud parties, home improvements, a new car, unexpected shopping, gifts, changes in personality, boasting.
Look at the cell phone movements of at risk mil/contractors. Who are they meeting, talking to? What new cell phones do their cell phones stay next to for some time?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Sounds like the usual government/security-industrial-complex trolling for more funding/authority. Been there, heard that.
For those not paying attention Wikileaks have revealed extensive technical details about the CIA's ability to force certificates and plants traces into systems to frame people for the actions of the US security agencies.
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/11/10/cia_kaspersky_fake_certs_ploy/
While I have no doubt that North Korea would gladly do so, but we need to face a few facts about the ability of the NK's to really do this much damage.
That has to be propaganda. I've read North Korea doesn't even have computers.
#DeleteFacebook
Why dont we make it easy for poor old kim. Lets make a little back door for encryption on all our phones. :)
I can see him grinning ear to ear if that ever happens. ROFL
[($)]
So lead blindly.
"Norks" is British slang for breasts.
Don't nuke the norks.
Considering the other story about NASA launching a reactor, those norks will drop off by themselves if anything goes wrong.
The only people threatened by North Korea at the North Koreans.
http://observer.com/2014/12/michael-malice-on-the-magical-world-of-north-korea/
That is what communism does: makes people poor and destitute. The effectiveness of war propaganda is astounding and disheartening. This is a country which does not have 1/1,000,000th of a chance at being an existential threat to the U.S., and yet the war profiteers are trying to make us all clamor for another stupid and expensive military engagement that will kill countless people.
http://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/2017/06/29/north-korea-is-desperate-to-avoid-military-conflict-author-michael-malice.html
https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/how-america-north-korea-could-start-nuclear-war
The only reason we do not hear of all those other countries hacking the US defence systems is either because they don't want to, or because they are better at it (than N.K.) and cover their tracks.
Rather than thinking that NK represents some sort of technological elite, intent on harming the USA, the government should remember that they are the least capable "power" trying to do this. So instead of defending against them and then thinking that is sufficient, a responsible attitude would be to understand that every other government is doing the same - but without getting caught.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
if anyone does network monitoring, and IPS/IDS stuff - this has been ongoing for the last 15 years.
either America media is an idiot, probably, or the media is an idiot for finally reporting what everyone like a teenage with a Linux box with a static IP and fail2ban has installed and monitoring the logs. set don't come back for a year or so.
just block transient countries from internet access to the US internet network assets and you have your hackers blocked..
https://apple.slashdot.org/sto...
[($)]
system crackers target all high value targets
Radiation...fallout...prevailing winds....cancer in America. See a progression doofus?
access to computers and general knowledge of how to do these things would be scarce if even existant to the NK population. Even the government wouldn't be particularly able to do these things.
"'weakest links" within the firms, such as Human Resources personnel'
Bruhaha
She lost, get over it! Move on!
Technically for one's allies. Cyber-framing, a power that security agencies are gagging to get, or in some countries, just got, means evidence will be planted for final proof of aggressive behaviour, requiring a retaliatory strike.
If the person is already non grata (not welcome), one can use smear campaigns and economic/ political/ military bullying. Those last options become more difficult if the victim has a (nuclear) weapon. Hence the desire for a surprise attack, sorry pre-emptive strike, by cyber-warfare.
Many of our leaders ignored North Korea as just poor dumbass communists with no means of ever being a nuclear power. Obviously while the world was ignoring them they became one of our worst nightmares. I think history repeats itself because we did the same with China too. Just incredible how we focus far to much on just one threat and the rest gather up steam.
This is all propaganda. Slashdot use to be a site where valid data and news could be provided, but recently it's been used as a tool for propaganda in the following topics
North Korea = Bad
Guns = Bad
Nationalism = Bad
Freedom = Bad
Every country with internet infrastructure is attempting to hack, probe, manipulate every other country.
Why pick on NK?
Funny how dirty tricks are ok if we do it to them, but oh horror! They're trying to do it to us! Badness! "We" being any first world country.
It would be retarded, even more moronic, to vote for the same old same old. Hillary the unindicted felon, or Jeb the play toy of the Establishment, or Kucinich, the tool of whoever is holding him at the moment? Sanders, avowed socialist?
Only Crux had my attention, and the Establishment hated him even more than Trump. If you're paying attention, you know the Establishment hates only YOU more than Trump. Either because you are in the way of their total dominance, or because you are a loathsome ignorant shill, beneath contempt for your continued loyalty despite the plain evidence that you also will be destroyed. You deserve their contempt.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Why the f*ck is this sh*t even online. If it is connected to the internet it is not secure.
They can't have hackers. Kim Jun Un hasn't invented the intarwebs yet, but he was part of the only manned mission to space and to the moon. He's a real badass, until Seal Team 6 puts a .50 cal slug through his dome and the world becomes a better place.
So answer this:
So what can be said about a people who can't seem to get anything but criminals, psychopaths, and overall scum as presidential candidates ? How did it come to this ? And why the fuck do you, as a people, tolerate this ?
What can be said about the people of the United States ? At what point do we stop blaming the wolves and start blaiming the fucking sheep ?
he's laughing with them and at us.
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Because the USA, despite its flaws, is still a pretty remarkable place.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
So that's it ? That's your answer ?
Sounds more like pathological denial to me than an attempt at finding an explanation to a HUGE, nation-wide major problem that keeps getting worse.
Won't say I'm really surprised, though, unfortunately.
We could have had Ted Cruz as a Republican candidate.
But that would have been disaster, for he would have played by the 'rules', and been defeated, and a Clinton presidency would be the end of our democracy.
This is all in large part the result of the unholy alliance of the Democratic Party, the major media in the US and worldwide, and the global Leftist movement. They have elected twice a man who admitted to a relationship with a junior intern that would have resulted in a high school principal being dismissed in similar circumstances. His wife served as a Cabinet officer, during which their own private foundation accepted millions of dollars in donations from foreign powers in a manner that should raise serious questions about her ability to act int eh best interests of the US. We elected a President of dubious qualifications, and then watched as he ruled by Executive Order, permitted his Attorney General and FBI Director to plainly state that a former Secretary of State violated federal record keeping law, yet refused to prosecute the prima facie case, and was heard telling then Russian President Dmitri Medvedev "After my election I have more flexibility" during a global nuclear security meeting.
And now the complaints about our current President include unsubstantiated reports that he engaged in unseemly and disturbing acts during a visit to Russia - reports discredited, and on their face not merely irrational but the work of fantasy - that he has enacted Executive Orders undoing previous administration acts, which is legal and not even unprecedented, accused of a cozy relationship with the current President of Russia, and that claimed relationship to be one detrimental to US interests, despite evidence that his predecessor had similar a relationship with the previous Russian President. Our current President's offense? Not kowtowing to the established order.
We have the President we have for two overriding reasons: First, too many Americans no linger believe either major party acts in their interest, and it should be plain to any moderately curious observers that there is ample evidence for such a belief, and second, because he pledged to do things these Americans wanted done. And he is, in fact, making marked and obvious progress in doing so.
Our current President is a breath of fresh air, BECAUSE of his uncharacteristically blunt manner, his lack of political polish, and his unwillingness to play by the established insider rules.
Of course I would not lump our President into the group of " criminals, psychopaths, and overall scum". But given the credible reports of other politicians in the US engaging in frauds and deceits to ensure the results of candidate selection, the obvious money-laundering of one party, the still unresolved matters of a former Secretary of State and the handling of emails, records, and classified information in plain violation of law, the compelling evidence of intelligence gathering by our former President of information about an opposition party's Presidential candidate during the last months of the campaign, acts which should send a chill down every American citizen's spine, the revelations of political organizations denied fair or at least equal treatment by the IRS in an manner that is difficult to explain in any other way than deliberate politically motivated interference, it should be more understandable that our nation suffers from a breakdown in the rule of law inspired, abetted, and promoted by actions from the very top of our federal government.
American citizens have spoken. A change was demanded. It was made. Our Presidential elections are designed to favor a consensus of states for indeed our nation is named the United States of America. The dichotomy between urban and rural populations emphasizes the foresight of its founders, and is in my opinion necessary, vital, crucial to our survival, for if the cities rule, our nation would disintegrate literally and figuratively.
The complaints about the qualities of Presidential candidates speaks as much to the Leftist agenda in the US as it does to the general decline in ethics, morality, and the rule of law. But I repeat myself.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
I mean we complain about the Russians influencing our citizens, but it's ok for US to influence our own citizens. Double standard.
We complain NK is hacking us, when we hack them.
We complain China is hacking us, when we hack them.
Game over. Gone home. Switched off.