China

Maybe it wasn’t China. Maybe it was, but suppose it wasn’t. That’s the reaction of at least one computer security consultant to yesterday’s blockbuster report from the security firm Mandiant, which accused a unit of China’s People’s Liberation Army of carrying out a series of hacking attacks against companies in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and elsewhere over a series of years.

Jeffrey Carr, CEO of Taia Global, writes today in a blog post that he thinks Mandiant’s report is full of holes.

Chinese state media stepped up the war of words on Thursday over allegations of sophisticated cyberattacks on US firms, branding the accusations a "commercial stunt" and accusing Washington of ulterior motives.

American Internet security firm Mandiant earlier this week said that a Chinese military cyberspy unit is targeting US and other foreign firms and organisations with hacking attacks.

How did security firm Mandiant put names to two previously unknown Chinese hackers who, it says, steal American corporate secrets for the Chinese government? With a little inadvertent help from Anonymous.

A private technology security firm on Tuesday described in extraordinary detail efforts it blamed on a Chinese military unit to hack into 141 businesses, mostly inside the U.S., and steal commercial secrets. China denies the claim. Here's a look at the company, Mandiant, and why its report is significant.

What is Mandiant?

Thanks to cybersecurity firm Mandiant, we now have a video of a hacker believed to be linked to the Chinese military infiltrating and stealing files from unidentified English language targets.

The video comes as part of Mandiant's 60-page report, first reported by the New York Times, that claims China's military is responsible for cyberattacks on more than 140 foreign businesses, many of which are in the United States.

A secretive Chinese military unit is believed to be behind a prolific series of hacking attacks, a U.S. computer security company said, contradicting claims by China's government that it is not involved in such operations.

The report by Mandiant identified the People's Liberation Army's Shanghai-based Unit 61398 as the most likely driving force behind the hacking. Mandiant said it believed the unit had carried out "sustained" attacks on a wide set of industries.

China and the United States have traded accusations of hacking following reports that The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post were all infiltrated by allegedly Chinese intruders. Google’s Eric Schmidt blasts China for waging undeclared cyber war in a forthcoming book, while Rupert Murdoch—perhaps relieved to find one of his newspapers hacked, rather than hacking—has taken to Twitter to highlight alleged attacks. But conclusively tracing any intrusion back to its source is usually impossible, allowing all parties some measure of plausible deniability.

Wars fought using computer code and hackers are affecting countries all over the world.

Earlier this month it was revealed that US President Barack Obama had powers to launch pre-emptive attacks if there was credible evidence that another country was planning to use cyber weaponry against the US.

If the President approves attacks the US will be able to attack other countries by disrupting their computer systems with destructive code.

In 2007, I opened an email from an unknown sender. The message greeted me by a nickname known only to family and close friends. I was in Shanghai, unwinding late at night after a long day, pleased to be contacted by someone familiar from across the Pacific. I figured someone close to me must have gotten a new email address. But the note was signed “Eric.” I did not know an Eric.

Some 55 per cent of Chinese computers are infected with malware, the highest of any country worldwide, according to the latest Annual Security Report from Panda Security.

The Spanish security vendor’s Panda Labs research team reported 27 million new strains of malware in 2012, bringing the total in its database to 125m.