Shouldn't we be taking these Chinese hackings more seriously?

[Gravitycollapse]

For Christ's sake, the Chinese state is actively and obviously stealing US and other nation's state secrets. Doesn't that warrant a bit more than investigative reports?

http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22692778

[msongs]

1. the geovernment seems to allow them, so what's the big deal? nt

[FreakinDJ]

7. We allow them to undermind our economy - why not our military too

[sharp_stick]

2. I think they're probably being taken pretty seriously

The NSA tends to not be all that forthcoming about what it is that they do for a reason. You and I probably don't rate highly enough to expect a briefing.

[Archaic]

3. We've allowed many other countries to do this to us for years.

No reason to get upset when China does it if we're not when others are caught and we're not upset.

(semi-sarcasm there)

To be fair, the report that the BCC cites specifically doesn't point to any specific country. But unnamed contractors and generals say that China is doing stuff, so this is probably them again. (I love unnamed sources, they're always reputable)

And the hacking is generally of the defense contractors who don't bother *really* securing their systems, the FBI or the NSA lets them know it happened.

In my opinion, this is a puff story designed to ward off defense cuts, and increase spending on spying/data mining/tightening up the internet.

Everybody *knows* the Chinese or the Russians, or the mob, or Eastasia or whoever we are currently saying are the sources of our woes are the culprit.

Who knows, maybe Boeing or Lockheed have a new design they can't get the Feds to buy. But maybe if the current design was "stolen" we'd need something to counter it.

[Shivering Jemmy]

5. No

'Who knows, maybe Boeing or Lockheed have a new design they can't get the Feds to buy. But maybe if the current design was "stolen" we'd need something to counter it.'

That's not how it works.

[Archaic]

9. "It's China" doesn't work either.

My point is that it's all speculation, without information.

This time it's pointed at China. 10 years ago Russia would have been at fault in the story, due to the whisperings of unnamed sources and highly placed generals.

[Shivering Jemmy]

4. It is being taken very seriously

By industry I can tell you that.

[Skittles]

6. we willingly pimp our jobs off to China

it is DISGUSTING

[Egalitarian Thug]

8. Nah, nothing to see here. The Chinese are our friends and partners and would never, ever do anything

like that. I'm sure it's all just a misunderstanding or an accident or rouge hackers or something. In any case it's nothing to worry our little heads over, just go buy some crap and leave it to the adults.

[sarisataka]

10. We should be taking it very seriously

but are pretty much ignoring it since we don't want to upset our trade with China.

Though not an IT specialist, I recently attended a briefing on Chinese cyber warfare that left several security experts with their mouths hanging open or shaking their heads in disgust with basic steps that are not being taken. I can't speak for the NSA, but the FBI is basically doing nothing on this subject.

It is a bit pricy, but the top book on the subject is on Amazon:
21st Century Chinese Cyberwarfare
http://www.amazon.com/21st-Century-Chinese-Cyberwarfare-Governance/dp/1849283346/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1369791241&sr=8-1&keywords=hagestad
if you are in China do not try to order it; it is banned there.

[Warren Stupidity]

11. You think we aren't doing the same thing to them and everyone else?

[Heywood J]

12. My question is always why this information is on computers that are publicly accessible

via some sort of network path. Nothing like that should ever be connected to a network that connects directly to the Internet. Keep the engineers on a private network without any connections to the outside world or to other connected groups. You can't remotely hack that to which you can't remotely connect. Infection is still possible but the odds are much lower.

I suppose it doesn't help when a number of places not only connect everybody's computer to the Internet, give each PC a public IP because they don't want to configure a router, and are also still running Windows XP with various states of patching.