Chinese Hackers Target NYPD Too, Says Police Commissioner

[Coventina]

Source: Wall Street Journal

New York City’s police department joins the Dalai Lama, the Joint Strike Fighter and the U.S. electrical grid as the latest alleged target of Chinese hackers.

New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Wednesday that hackers make at least 70,000 attempts every day to access computer systems of the New York Police Department, the largest police force in the U.S. Kelly said most of the attacks originated from computers with IP addresses in China and the Netherlands, according to Newsday, but that all attempts have failed thanks to the department’s security system.

“It’s a threat we must continue to pay close attention to every day,” he said in a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, likening the attacks on the NYPD computers to the hacking of the Pentagon’s $300 billion Joint Strike Fighter project.

“It’s roughly like taking a pail of water and throwing it against the wall to see where the leaks are,” the commissioner told Newsday.



Read more: http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/04/23/chinese-hackers-target-nypd-too-says-police-commissioner/

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

1. Is it really the Chinese and Dutch trying to hack...

... or is it cyber crooks in the U.S. bouncing their attacks off the thousands of unsecured servers in China? Those fake anti-virus trojans that ask you for $39 to clean your computer have been mentioned to be only possible if being run from the U.S. because Visa and MasterCard do not allow merchant accounts to Chinese or Russian based sites.

Back when I was tracing every weird hit to my firewall, I found that 95% of them came from China, but of course my firewall blocked them.

[moggie]

4. That's what I've always assumed

When I read of government departments, the military etc claiming attacks from sinister Chinese hackers, possibly in the employ of the Chinese government, I smile, because I suspect just about everyone gets lots of probes from Chinese addresses. That's certainly the case at my work, very much not a juicy target. Yesterday's top four probing us were China, Russia, Brazil and the US, with China leading Russia by 50%. Most of this is probably botnets at work (there are millions of poorly-secured PCs in China), but some will be bad guys elsewhere in the world using Chinese hosts to cover their tracks. It's what I'd do, because whenever I've had to complain to Chinese ISPs I've met with silence.

[SlingBlade]

2. They're using our own technology against us

Made in China huh

[shadowknows69]

3. If you were making most of the U.S. commercial technology

Wouldn't you throw in a few back doors? They probably have every cheap appliance in America wired to shut down with the throw of a switch. Mass chaos will ensue after the first month of missed "American Idol". Civilization will fall soon after.

[SlingBlade]

5. Yep, No American Idol, No Civilization !

At least here in the states.

They KNOW our Weakness !