Chinese hack into White House network

FT.COM ^ | November 7 2008 | Demetri Sevastopulo

[BurbankKarl]

The Pentagon got hit a couple years ago too.....The Chinese rebuilt Cisco routers/switching equipment allowing a backdoor, then became the lowest bidder on the government contracts.....Pretty smart if you ask me.

[stuartcr]

This is why they have crypto devices.

[taxcontrol]

In 2001 I proposed an approach to the National Security Counsel that would have build a NORAD like traffic monitoring for the Internet. It would have provided early detection of and rapid response to these type of attacks.

Due to Democrat tactics of scare mongering and lawsuits against the early Bush presidency, the idea was not accepted. Now with Obama in, we have no hope for it's adoption.

[CutePuppy]

Okay, I keep reading about these stories.

Secure intranets people...unplug these damn things from the Internet!

You are right, it's the rehashing of the same story... email systems are on the intranet (caveat: except mobile devices, which should be at least on VPN). At the most, what Chinese are getting (if anything, if the story has any truth to it) would be some stuff that looks like email dump that's planted in the honey-pot in the DMZ area. I think these stories are done periodically to "confirm" to Chinese that they really got something of value, and for domestic consumption to promote the importance and funding of government's and military technology infrastucture.

My computers are probed all the time, mostly from China IPs - it's not difficult to throw them off or feed them some garbage (depending on the mood or method of attack), most of the damage is usually a slowdown of access.

[ckilmer]

You have to think that the US and other western governments are doing the same thing to the chinese because so little is said publicly about these incidents.

[snowsislander]

At the most, what Chinese are getting (if anything, if the story has any truth to it) would be some stuff that looks like email dump that's planted in the honey-pot in the DMZ area. I think these stories are done periodically to "confirm" to Chinese that they really got something of value, and for domestic consumption to promote the importance and funding of government's and military technology infrastucture.

That's largely my take also. Certainly it's far more likely that Red China is simply getting what we wanted them to have. The Chicoms also probably realize that they haven't actually received any useful data.

I am not sure about your last point "...to promote the importance and funding of government's and military technology infrastructure", because whatever value such tales have in scaring up funding, these same woeful tales also have the negative effect of making people think our government technical honchos are complete dolts.

Certainly I don't feel inclined to add any funding to the already unlimited amounts that these folks already spend just because they want to broadcast that they have mishandled the situation up to this point. Instead, I would just as soon see them replaced with people who are apparently more technically adroit.

[bkepley]

I wonder if there’s not a cold war type thing going on between the US and China. We never hear of our hacks on them that are discovered. Communist countrys don’t publicize their failures.

[Calpernia]

>>>What kind of idiots do we have running the IT systems there?

Well, they got into the Pentagon. That would make the White House a piece of cake.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1890608/posts
Chinese military hacked into Pentagon

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2099361/posts
China-sourced fake chips used in US military, says BusinessWeek

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1891445/posts
Pentagon: China Gearing Up for High-Tech Warfare

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1913355/posts
China hijacks Google, Yahoo, MSN, Youtube...

http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1904123/posts
Selling National Security (China bids for portion of 3Com)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1908575/posts
Will 3Com Deal Funnel U.S. Secrets to China?

http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9784235-7.html
Cisco partners with Chinese appliance maker

http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/b02/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=302069
Cisco China

>>>Designed to show how Cisco has taken its U.S.-based infrastructure and applied it to China. It is stunning in its impact as one notes how so much of what is being done in the United States in terms of the intranet has been transferred to China.<<<

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/global/asiapac/news/2006/pr_07-05b.html
China Telecom Selects Cisco as Primary Supplier for ChinaNet 2006 Expansion

[Calpernia]

ping

[SE Mom]

Alarming bit of news.

Given the amount of money we’ve borrowed from China and how dependent our economy is on them- I expect NOTHING to be done about this -maybe a little tsk-tsking- but nothing meaningful.

[johnfranks999]

In the realm of risk, unmanaged possibilities become probabilities: These data breaches and thefts are due to a lagging business culture. As CIO, I’m always looking for ways to help my team, business teams, and ad hoc measures of various vendors, contractors and internal team members. A book that is required reading is “I.T. WARS: Managing the Business-Technology Weave in the New Millennium.”
We keep a few copies kicking around - it would be a bit much to expect outside agencies to purchase it on our say-so. But, particularly when entertaining bids for projects and in the face of challenging change, we ask potential solutions partners to review relevant parts of the book, and it ensures that these agencies understand our values and practices.
The author, David Scott, has an interview here that is a great exposure: http://businessforum.com/DScott_02.html
The book came to us as a tip from one of our interns who attended a course at University of Wisconsin, where the book is in use. It has helped us to understand that, while various systems of security are important, no system can overcome laxity, ignorance, or deliberate intent to harm. The real crux of the matter is education and training to the organization as a whole – and a recurring schedule of training – in building a sustained culture and awareness; an efficient prism through which every activity is viewed from a security perspective prior to action.
I like to pass along things that work, in the hope that good ideas continue to make their way to me.

[mewzilla]

Meanwhile, from last month...

World Bank (Allegedly) Hacked

Related....?

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

I doubt this.

I know what operating system the White House backbone runs on, and it’s not Windows

You doubt what? Do you believe that systems using Unix, Linux, etc. cannot be hacked?

[pissant]

My guess is we have chinese moles strategically planted throughout the gov’t as well, with prestigious jobs and IT degrees.

Hell, we have had plenty of spies working in our nuke labs, with the full blessings of the Clinton Administration.

[pissant]

Smart for them. Incredibly retarded for us.

[AppyPappy]

They’ll just install sniffers in Lafayette Park.

[Calpernia]

Remember the hacking during the primaries? The software company that the sites used had backdowns. There were former pentagon officials that now work at that China Based software company.

[pissant]

Nice. And I recall Duncan Hunter scuttling the Chicoms and Romney’s attempts to sell 3-COM to the PLA.

[A Texan]

I would guess that we are doing the same to them.

This is a big cat and mouse game. What I would be more afraid would be us never catching them hacking our network.

[Dubya-M-DeesWent2SyriaStupid!]

Remember the report right after the financial crisis came to light that China and Russia hacked into World Bank's computer? Then they hacked the McCain and Obama camapigns computers and now this?!?!?!?