Google: China Hacked Email

[Grim Reaper]

http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2011/06/01/heres-the-fake-gmail-login-chinese-hackers-used-to-steal-u-s-activist-data/

 

check out this link...

 

Look at the two Gmail login pages in the images on that link, (click to enlarge them) and ask yourself: Would you have spotted the difference?

 

 

Google is accusing China of espionage and state sponsored hacking, and the FBI is investigating.

 

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304563104576361300123816450.html

 

IMO the Chinese can deny it all they want, but they are surely involved.

 

Google didn't mention the possibility of involvement by the Chinese government in the latest attacks but said they came from an area that is home to a national-security arm of the People's Liberation Army.

 

...Beijing in recent weeks has acknowledged more participation by its military and government on the Internet and suggested that China's capabilities are weak compared with those of the U.S.

 

PLA spokesman Geng Yansheng last week confirmed the existence of a long-rumored military unit devoted to cyberspace, according to a posting on the government's primary website.

 

The PLA unit is popularly known as the Blue Army, a name apparently picked to distinguish it from the Communist Party's main fighting machine, nicknamed the Red Army.

 

Mr. Geng offered few details, and it was unclear exactly what the unit does. "There are reports the PLA established a Blue Army. That is set up based on needs of training and improving the level of network security," he said.

 

[PHANTASM]

I read about this a bit today. The Chinese say it could have been anyone, even someone redirecting their IP to look like it came from China. They also point out rightly that far more phishing hacks like this come from within the US than from China. And that the US deliberately hacks other countries too (stuxnet worm anyone?).

 

The fact that it was mostly Chinese dissidents and US govt people who were targeted makes it look like something China would do. But it could be someone who just wanted info from one important person, and all the others were to provide cover so people would blame China. Hard to tell what happened really.

 

People just need to pay more attention when they log into a website and make sure it is the right one not a fake. The US govt has secure systems so why would they be using Gmail except for personal use? Government employees should not be using Gmail for anything work-related.

 

And if you are a prominent Chinese dissident I think you would expect some phishing/social engineering attacks. That is just common sense.

[Chuckun]

Heh, I had a Brazilian mobile device hack my emails just yesterday.. (IP 187.87.104.44)

 

I'm not worried about China. Only people I've seen access mine / others' gmail accounts are Brazilians, Russians, Romanians, and another one I don't remember (not that I have anything against any of these countries, just happens to be my personal experience with gmail h4x0rz)

[Grim Reaper]

 

 

People just need to pay more attention when they log into a website and make sure it is the right one not a fake. The US govt has secure systems so why would they be using Gmail except for personal use? Government employees should not be using Gmail for anything work-related.

 

 

 

In my line of work, I work with a lot of classified US Government employees and contractors (US DOD, Nuclear Energy, Strategic Command, National Missile Defense, DHS/National Center for Missing/Exploited Children, etc etc ), and I assist them in figuring out their Server issues. As a part of that work, we work on a lot of black servers (off the grid on private networks), however in order for me to assist them I need to see logs, configurations, scripts etc. The only way they can get me that information is to copy the information to an authorized thumb drive, and send it via personal mail on an unclassified network via personal/cloaked email accounts. Essentially they have no outside internet access on those servers. That limits the private networks exposure to anything external sniffing/capturing data, but still allows them an outlet to provide me with unclassified scrubbed data.

 

I'm sure in much the same way, in order to have a semblance of normal life, they use similar off the grid accounts for family/personal business too, and there are times when those accounts are also used for similar unclassified communications. Also, many high G level Federal employees do not always have access to secure networks when away from their office, or they do not work with secure environments as a part of their normal business.

 

I'm sure there is a myriad of additional possibilities, including encryption solutions...