UPDATE! Chinese Military Hack Attacks Might Originate in NORTH KOREAN

Last month we reported that security experts from Mandiant believed a Chinese military unit was responsible for multiple hack attacks on US companies. Mandiant released a report that identified ‘Unit 61398′ as the most likely source of attacks on at least US 141 organisations, “across a diverse set of industries beginning as early as 2006″.

“The nature of ‘Unit 61398′s’ work is considered by China to be a state secret; however, we believe it engages in harmful ‘Computer Network Operations’,” Mandiant said in the report. ”It is time to acknowledge the threat is originating in China, and we wanted to do our part to arm and prepare security professionals to combat that threat effectively.”

The Mandiant report said that Unit 61398 is located in Shanghai’s Pudong district, China’s financial and banking hub, and staffed by perhaps thousands of people proficient in English as well as computer programming and network operations.

There are now suspicions that the facility might be shared with North Korean backed hackers? An unnamed source from South Korea’s presidential office was quoted by the Yonhap news agency as saying the discovery of the IP address indicated Pyongyang was responsible for the attack on Wednesday. A previous attack on a South Korean newspaper that the government in Seoul traced back to North Korea also used a Chinese IP address :: Read the full article »»»»

APPLE HACKED

The consumer electronics and technology behemoth that is Apple, has confirmed that it’s the latest victim of a malicious hack attack.

However, the tech-giant says the invaders malware was repelled before any data was able to be plundered. Apple says a “small number” of its computer systems were infected, but they were isolated from it’s main network.

Apple is working with law enforcement to hunt down the hackers, who appear to be tied to a series of recent cyber attacks on US companies.

The malicious software, or malware, took advantage of a vulnerability in a Java program used as a “plug-in” for web-browsing programs :: Read the full article »»»»

Chinese Military Hack Attacks

Computer security experts from Mandiant say they believe a Chinese military unit is responsible for multiple hacking attacks against US companies.

The secretive security company has released a rare report that identifies ‘Unit 61398′ as the most likely source of attacks on at least 141 organisations, “across a diverse set of industries beginning as early as 2006″.

“The nature of ‘Unit 61398′s’ work is considered by China to be a state secret; however, we believe it engages in harmful ‘Computer Network Operations’,” Mandiant said in the report.

“It is time to acknowledge the threat is originating in China, and we wanted to do our part to arm and prepare security professionals to combat that threat effectively.”

The report says Unit 61398 is located in Shanghai’s Pudong district, China’s financial and banking hub, and staffed by perhaps thousands of people proficient in English as well as computer programming and network operations.

The unit had stolen “hundreds of terabytes of data”.

Clients including The New York Times have hired Mandiant to clean up their systems after cyberattacks :: Read the full article »»»»

Facebook Hacked

Facebook says its computer system has been targeted in a series of attacks by an unidentified hacker group, however, the social media behemoth has stressed they don’t believe there is any evidence that user data has been compromised.

The company says the malware came from the infected website from a mobile developer.

“Last month, Facebook security discovered that our systems had been targeted in a sophisticated attack,” the company said in a blog post.

“The attack occurred when a handful of employees visited a mobile developer website that was compromised. We remediated all infected machines, informed law enforcement, and began a significant investigation that continues to this day.”

The social network, which says it has more than 1 billion active users worldwide, said it was not the sole target. Facebook’s announcement follows recent cyber attacks on other prominent websites :: Read the full article »»»»

China’s PORN Crack Down!

More than fifty websites, blogs and microblog accounts have been shut down over the past week in China, not a huge number right?  it is if your a pornster in China, in it’s latest round of crackdowns on online porn the government’s State Internet Information Office - SIIO – said the websites were closed for posting pornographic images, articles, films, amateur videos, online ads for prostitutes.

The SIIO was setup in May 2011, and is the  online branch of the überpowerful State Council Information Office, the communist states censorship office. China’s Internet, with the world’s largest number of users – more than 450 million – is a booming industry, attracting investors and government agencies hoping for a stake in online revenues through licensing and regulation.

The National Office Against Pornographic and Illegal Publications said Tuesday that nearly 1.8 million websites had been checked since the launch of the campaign, and 2,195 cases of dissemination of online pornography have been dealt with.

The office received more than 160,000 porn-related tip-offs from the general public and paid out about more than $AU75,000/¥500,000 to around 5oo informants. Companies and government departments also joined in the campaign. As part of the sting, China Mobile organized 20 employees – mothers of teenagers – to assist with monitoring and reporting mobile sites :: Read the full article »»»»