An electronic spy network that has infiltrated the computers of government offices, NGOs and activist groups in more than 100 countries has been surreptitiously stealing documents and eavesdropping on electronic correspondence, say a group of researchers at the University of Toronto.
More than 1,200 computers at embassies, foreign ministries, news media outlets and non-governmental organizations based primarily in South and Southeast Asia have been infiltrated by the network since at least the spring of 2007, according to the researchers' detailed 53-page report, as have computers in the offices of the Dalai Lama, the Asian Development Bank and the Associated Press in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong...
The computers were infected either after workers clicked on an e-mail attachment containing malware or clicked on a URL that took them to a rogue web site where the malware downloaded to their computer. The malware includes a feature for turning on the web camera and microphone on a computer in order to secretly record conversations and activity in a room. (more)
The Information Warfare Monitor, a Canadian cyber-espionage watchdog, goes to pains not to point the finger of blame at the Chinese government for a massive China-based cyberspy ring it has uncovered. "While our analysis reveals that numerous politically sensitive and high-value computer systems were compromised in ways that circumstantially point to China as the culprit," it writes in a report issued March 29, "we do not know the exact motivation or the identity of the attacker(s), or how to accurately characterize this network of infections as a whole."
Beijing has always officially denied undertaking such electronic espionage. But given that the IWM has identified at least 1,295 computers in 103 countries, mostly in the foreign ministries or embassies of various Asian governments; that its investigation was triggered by a request from Beijing's adversary, exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama, who was concerned the computers of his network had been hacked; and past accusations that Beijing has engaged in cyberspying, including against the U.S., the old suspicions will not only be reawakened but intensified. (more) (Doh!)
