Chinese overheid zit achter 5 internetaanvallen? (Engels)

[zippie666]

It's not exactly the wind-up to World War III, but a curious war of words has erupted recently over alleged "cyber attacks" between China and several other nations. First, a wave of attacks in the UK, Germany, and the United States from Chinese-based computers had the Chinese foreign ministry issuing an official denial that their government had been involved. Then, officials from New Zealand reported that Chinese spies had been behind a recent spate of attacks on their computer systems, although no confidential information had been compromised. France then got into the game, stating that they too had experienced attacks on their systems, although they could not say with certainty that the Chinese government was directly involved.

The attacks, regardless of their exact origin or intent, naturally encouraged reprisals. Reuters reported recently that Chinese government computers have also come under attack. Lou Qinjian, China's Vice Minister of Information Industry, said that the attacks caused "massive damage"—no word on whether giant crabs were involved—and that his country's Internet infrastructure was "riddled with security holes that had made a mockery of the ruling Communist Party's censorship and exposed many secrets to spies."

So are there actual "cyber wars" going on between governments, intent on dealing massive damage to the infrastructure of other countries? Or is the entire affair simply the result of bored hackers on different continents? As with the recent cyber attack on Estonia by Russian hackers, the anonymous nature of the Internet makes finding the ringleaders of such attacks a difficult proposition at best. While it's easy to trace an IP to a particular computer, finding the operator of said computer requires some old-fashioned and tedious detective work.

Giacomo Paoni, the chief technical officer of the security firm WSLabi, said in a statement sent to Ars that Chinese ISPs may have been partially responsible for making these sorts of attacks so prevalent. "Internet Service Providers offering Bulletproof hosting—aka bulk-friendly hosting—have a high degree of tolerance as to what actions their customers can carry out," he said, "therefore they are usually used by attackers and spammers from all over the world as a good way to hide their tracks." However, this doesn't necessarily rule out government involvement. Paoni points out that China's ISPs also act as a "perfect shield" for digital espionage operations. Chinese military hackers have already drawn up wargame plans for attacks intended to disable US military assets such as carrier task forces in the event of a real war, so the idea of government-sponsored attacks is not out of the question.

The good news about these "cyber wars" is that the attacks have enabled the countries in question to identify and fix weak spots in their Internet infrastructure. Repairing security holes in operating systems and applications helps to defend against everyday hackers and spammers, who pose as much of a threat to our computerized world as foreign governments.


Bron: Arstechnica.com



Wat denken jullie ervan?

[Robbe]

Dat die Chinezen een goeie training krijgen, als ze straffeloos mogen proberen om hun theorie om te zetten in cyber aanvallen.
Maar ook dat China nu wel erg in zijn vuistje zal lachen dat ze nog steeds in de WTO zitten.

[zippie666]

Het is eigenlijk logisch hé dat landen zich bezig houden met cyberaanvallen, zo kan je de vijand eigenlijk wel hard treffen, trachten hun communicatie uit te schakelen.

Moest ik een terrorist zijn hé (en nu hoop ik dat morgen de flikken niet aan m'n deur staan, want ik ben er geen) dan zou ik gewoon proberen de transatlantische kabels proberen te bombarderen! Toen er doorgebroken waren door die aardbeving in Azië recentelijk was er 5 miljard dollar kosten aan reparatie alleen al, laat staan de economische schade die geleden is. Als je dan zowel de verbinding Azië-Amerika als Europa-Amerika kan doorsnijden ben je wel geslaagd in je opzet denk ik

[Goendi]

Komaan :) Das pure propaganda... Het is ni voor niks dat er in de Aziatische regio zoveel hacked servers te vinden zijn.... Zowiezo komt 50% vd spam en ddos van die kanten. Daarnaast zijn er niet echt veel publieke ISP's in China, slechts een paar. Alle andere IP space wordt gefiltert door de overheid. Het zal dan heus ook een miniem deel zijn van die aanval die vanuit China zelf komt...