Security company McAfee recently discovered the largest series of cyber attacks to date, and while officials refused to say who was behind the hacking, they’re certain the culprit was a single national government.

 

Privately, computer experts suspect China, which has been accused before of orchestrating cyber assaults.

 

The newly discovered attacks (dubbed Operation Shady “RAT” by McAfee) began as early as 2006 and targeted the networks of 72 organizations, including the United Nations, governments and companies around the world.

 

Among those affected were the governments of the United States, Taiwan, India, South Korea, Vietnam and Canada, as well as non-government organizations like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the International Olympic Committee and the World Anti-Doping Agency.

 

Also coming under attack were companies ranging from defense contractors to high-tech businesses.

 

The attack on the UN began in 2008 and centered on the computers of the secretariat in Geneva. For almost two years the hackers quietly combed through reams of secret data.

 

“What is happening to all this data ... is still largely an open question,” wrote McAfee’s vice president of threat research, Dmitri Alperovitch, in a report on the attacks. “However, if even a fraction of it is used to build better competing products or beat a competitor at a key negotiation (due to having stolen the other team’s playbook), the loss represents a massive economic threat.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

State Actor Seen Behind "Enormous" Wave of Cyber Attacks (by Jim Finkle, Reuters)

Security Firm Identifies Global Cyber Spying (by David Barboza and Kevin Drew, New York Times)

Pentagon Classifies Cyber-Attack as Act of War (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)