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China-based Campaign Breached Satellite Operators, Defense Contractors and Telecommunications Companies in US: Symantec (reuters.com)

Posted by msmash on from the tussle-continues dept.

A sophisticated hacking campaign launched from computers in China burrowed deeply into satellite operators, defense contractors and telecommunications companies in the United States and southeast Asia, security researchers at Symantec Corp said on Tuesday. Reuters: Symantec said the effort appeared to be driven by national espionage goals, such as the interception of military and civilian communications. Such interception capabilities are rare but not unheard of, and the researchers could not say what communications, if any, were taken. More disturbingly in this case, the hackers infected computers that controlled the satellites, so that they could have changed the positions of the orbiting devices and disrupted data traffic, Symantec said. "Disruption to satellites could leave civilian as well as military installations subject to huge [real world] disruptions," said Vikram Thakur, technical director at Symantec. "We are extremely dependent on their functionality." Satellites are critical to phone and some internet links as well as mapping and positioning data. Symantec, based in Mountain View, California, described its findings to Reuters exclusively ahead of a planned public release. It said the hackers had been removed from infected systems.

4 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. Spy vs. Spy by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How dare they do to us what we are probably doing to them.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:Spy vs. Spy by AlwinBarni · · Score: 3, Insightful
      It's not about that, it's about the fact that there is no sufficient protection of critical US telecom infrastructure from foreign espionage.

      As the article says, they do not know what communication was intercepted and that the foreign actors had access to satellites controls.

      If all it's true it's pretty serious defense issue, far beyond "how dare".

  2. Suspect by duke_cheetah2003 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    A sophisticated hacking campaign launched from computers in China burrowed deeply into satellite operators, defense contractors and telecommunications companies in the United States and southeast Asia, security researchers at Symantec Corp said on Tuesday.

    I have no problem believing this. Seems legit. However, the TIMING of this report is extremely suspect. Why now? When there's a nasty trade-war brewing between China and the US. Yeah, suspect and shady as FUCK.

  3. Why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Why are these critical systems connected to a public network, THE INTERNET, in the first place? Air-gap these things!