[NYTr] China hacked into Pentagon computer network

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

AFP - Sep 4, 2007
http://www.afp.com/english/news/stories/070904044541.r8i8vfw1.html


China hacked into Pentagon computer network

BEIJING (AFP) - China's military successfully hacked into the
Pentagon's computer network, raising fears it could disrupt the US
defence department's systems, the Financial Times reported Tuesday.

The Chinese military's cyber attack was carried out in June following
months of efforts, the London-based newspaper said, citing unnamed
current and former US officials.

While the Pentagon declined to say who was behind the hacking, which
led to the shutdown of a computer system serving the office of Defence
Secretary Robert Gates, officials told the paper it was China's
People's Liberation Army.

"The PLA has demonstrated the ability to conduct attacks that disable
our system," the paper quoted a former US official as saying.

One senior US official reportedly said the Pentagon had pinpointed the
exact origin of the attack.

The paper quoted another person familiar with the event as saying there
was a "very high level of confidence... trending towards total
certainty" that the PLA was responsible.

The paper said both the US and Chinese militaries were widely assumed
to conduct computer espionage on each other.

"But US officials said the penetration in June raised concerns to a new
level because of fears that China had shown it could disrupt systems at
critical times," the Financial Times reported.

A spokesman for the Chinese defence ministry declined to comment on the
report when contacted by AFP on Tuesday.

China's foreign ministry also declined to comment immediately, asking
for questions to be faxed through.

Reports of China hacking into German government systems were also
raised last week between Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and visiting German
Chancellor Angela Merkel.

German weekly Der Spiegel reported that espionage programmes traced to
the PLA had been detected in computer systems at Merkel's office, the
foreign ministry and other government agencies in Berlin.

"We in the government took (the reports) as a matter of grave concern,"
Wen said after meeting Merkel.