China Surged with Cyber Attacks in 2010

According to the Government officials of China, nearly 500,000 cyber attacks in 2010 were implanted with the motive of attacking computers. A large part of these attacks were in the form of Trojan horse malware that are installed on computers, reports TECH ZONE 360 on August 9, 2011.

According to the National Computer Network Emergency Response Coordination Center of China, which is the country's primary computer security monitoring network, a majority of the attacks by the hackers were implanted in the form of malicious "Trojan" software with the aim of attacking the computers.

Out of the total Trojan horse attacks, about 14.7% of them originated from of the US and 8% from India.

During early August 2011, McAfee Inc claimed that cyber attacks that lasted for about 5 years had the intention of targeting more than 70 entities, including national governments. Some of the major targets of the attack included the UN, the International Olympic Committee, and many American companies.

From the point of view of McAfee, the culprit was most likely a nation state, and this time China is on high surveillance.

Hacking with a political or religious motif generally meddles up web pages, though in rare cases, it is the other way round and has the intention of publicity. Several websites of government agencies originating from Turkey are repeatedly targeted by IPs and hackers that frequently displays texts and pictures intended for political and religious campaigns.

With reference to domestic attacks, mostly financial institutes or online payment platforms are targeted. Hackers fraudulently steal customer information on these websites and further utilize it to gain the access of their financial accounts through online banking.

However, the Chinese report came to fore after a long period since US McAfee denied the fact that no direct evidence had been found for China to be involved in this act. The recent report by the company revealed an unparalleled series of cyber attack taking a toll of 72 government agencies and business organizations throughout the world.

Security experts held the view that cybercrime develops from the problem of attribution. It is easy to blame the attacker when the opponent is a nation. But technological advancement enables one to install an attack from a third-party country and it becomes even difficult to recognize the attacker.

Related article: China’s Best Initiatives To Deal With Spam

» SPAMfighter News - 8/18/2011