China Hacked a Navy Contractor and Secured a Trove of Highly Sensitive Data on Submarine Warfare (washingtonpost.com)

Ellen Nakashima and Paul Sonne, reporting for The Washington Post: Chinese government hackers have compromised the computers of a Navy contractor, stealing massive amounts of highly sensitive data related to undersea warfare -- including secret plans to develop a supersonic anti-ship missile for use on U.S. submarines by 2020, according to American officials. The breaches occurred in January and February, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. The hackers targeted a contractor who works for the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, a military organization headquartered in Newport, R.I., that conducts research and development for submarines and underwater weaponry. The officials did not identify the contractor. Taken were 614 gigabytes of material relating to a closely held project known as Sea Dragon, as well as signals and sensor data, submarine radio room information relating to cryptographic systems, and the Navy submarine development unit's electronic warfare library. The Washington Post agreed to withhold certain details about the compromised missile project at the request of the Navy, which argued that their release could harm national security.

Comments

NSA, traitors to the USA

[Anonymous Coward]

Just to remember. There was a time, long ago, when lots of security features were being developed and the NSA and other US security agencies intervened to make that more difficult.

• Export restrictions on security features so that all software had to be developed in an insecure version, with maybe a bit of time spent on a secure version.
• Backdoors so that everything was inherently insecure and overcomplicated.
• Failing to tell companies about vulnerabilities so they continued to develop insecure software.
• Failing to tell the public about insecurities so they continued to be unable to choose the more secure software.
• Arresting the ethical and uninterested hackers so nobody made the public care about security.
• Most of all, failing to insist that the software developed for government was secure so that nobody bothered.
• Interfering with the popularity of projects like FreeS/WAN instead of making them mandatory.

Now, when Trump starts some needless, stupid war against China, many American servicemen's lives will be lost because the NSA failed to do it's basic job - secure the communications and information of the USA. Or more likely, worse, the Chinese will feel bold enough to close off free navigation through the south China sea and eventually be powerful enough to destroy the US economy.

It's not that they weren't warned. They still did it and there are still traitors demanding backdoors in encryption.

Seriously?

[Zamphatta]

I have a hard time believing that in 2018, the gov't & its contractors, aren't locking down national security military secrets better than this. It's so close to unbelievable to me, that I have to wonder if this is misinformation left on a honeypot server. If the US gov't is really this loose with their classified information at this point in history....

doesn't pass the smell test

[Thud457]

"614 gigabytes" " in January and February"

So they were exfiltrating 10 Gigabytes a day from the contractor's network and nobody noticed?!!