Chinese Hackers Infiltrate Systems of Oil-And-Gas Enterprises: McAfee

McAfee the security company, on February 10, 2011, released a report, which identifies no less than 5 large Western oil-and-gas enterprises, which lately came under attack from Chinese hackers.

Stated McAfee in its report, hackers infiltrated the energy companies' computer systems through virus-laden electronic mails dispatched to top officials of the companies or through websites.

The cyber-assaults, which McAfee named as "Night Dragon," picked up the sizes of files which were extremely sensitive, such as project financing files, bidding plan files, and other crucial files related to proprietary details, McAfee said.

Stated Vice-President for Threat Research Dmitri Alperovitch for McAfee, he had notified US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) regarding the assaults, as a result an investigation had started. World.globaltimes.cn reported this on February 11, 2011.

McAfee stated that a hackers' gang possibly carried out the malevolent assaults, yet according to the company, it had spotted a particular person based in Shandong Province's Heze City in China who supplied the main command-and-control structure to the hackers. PCWorld.com reported this on February 10, 2011.

Stated George Kurtz, CTO of McAfee, the attackers employed a complicated combination of hacking methods, however, the techniques along with devices used were more-or-less unrefined. PCWorld.com reported this.

McAfee apparently downplayed the techniques that the hackers employed but stated that based on a recent evaluation as also after popular artifacts were discovered along with fact correlations established that a 2-4-year time-period was determined during when a constant endeavor had been going on.

Meanwhile, McAfee as well observes that China has a severe hazard of corporate espionage, where along with being alarmingly frequent, the practice sometimes seems as getting state sponsorship, just like Google's episode of cyber-assaults during January 2010.

Finally, it's been years that cyber-espionage has been aiming on the energy sector, McAfee says. During 2010, a report by the company outlined severe failures in the online-security of crucial infrastructure systems, like those of power and chemical plants, and oil refineries. Nearly all treacherous infiltrations were reported from the oil-and-gas industry (71%) in contrast with 54% of survey participants in general, when over 33% reported multiple hacks each 30-day period.

Related article: Chinese Hackers Threatening Korean Game Sites

» SPAMfighter News - 2/21/2011