Cyber Warfare II News, Pics, Views

Ultra

Junior Member
.........




Although I must say, I just can't help feeling China's best of best are all just script kiddies....

Why?


china-hackers-Wen-_2917943b.jpg



These men are China's best of best in hacking - the elite Unit 61398.

In his free time, 30-year-old Wen Xinyu (the one in the middle) likes to read Western philosophy, play Angry Birds on his iPad and listen to Beyond, a rock band from Hong Kong.

But it is his day job that has brought him to the attention of the FBI: Mr Wen, aka WinXYHappy, is allegedly a People's Liberation Army hacker who has stolen reams of trade secrets from some of America's largest companies.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
, Mr Wen and his four alleged colleagues at PLA Unit 61398, apparently a cyber-espionage unit in a Shanghai suburb, have erased their online presence, wiping clean their profiles, blogs and comments.

But the fragments that remain show the hackers to be low-paid geeks who never expected that anyone would pay attention to the hacking forums and gaming groups they frequented.

Mr Wen, who appears in one photograph online wearing an orange polo-shirt and celebrating his 30th birthday, was by far the most active of the five men, often collaborating with others on programs.

His account on Weibo,
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
version of Twitter, indicated that he likes "movies, travel and music".

On one hacking forum, underneath a post about how to steal login passwords for computers running on Windows, Mr Wen wrote: "Awesome! I happen to need this. Thank you!"

On another site, which offered a hack to download the Angry Birds computer game without buying it through the Apple store, Mr Wen wrote: "It works on my iPad. But when I downloaded Plants vs Zombies for the iPhone it was too small [for the screen of the iPad]."


And at the beginning of this year he appealed for help on writing programs to "monitor, connect, transmit data, save files and disconnect" in WinInet, the Microsoft Windows Internet application programming interface.


"To all the masters," he wrote. "Do you have any server-end experiments that I can study for a couple of days? I do not ask for all the codes, I know you must have your own secrets. I just want to know what kind of functions I need to use."


While it is not possible to confirm beyond doubt that all of WinXYHappy's posts were made by Mr Wen, details across different sites tallied, and in some cases he also used the same instant messaging identification number.

His account on a website devoted to information about US servers and domains has been wiped clean, as has his personal profile on the Tianya forum. But his is listed in Shanghai and being born in December 1983.

Some of his surviving comments reveal that he picked his online name because it was close to his real name, and that after work he only wanted to "play games endlessly".

In October 2007, he declared that the rising value of the Chinese renminbi would boost his salary's buying power. "But let's not have it rise too much, it is not good to provoke a crisis," he said.

Later that month he expressed dismay at how much it cost to have a free-spending girlfriend. "I want to ask my friends here, how many of you earn 10,000 yuan (£1,000) a month? That is a lot of money!"

Together with two of the other men named and shamed by the US justice department, Mr Wen was a member of a closed messaging group of 154 people on the Chinese service QQ.

Previously called "Poor people taking the government's ration", it has recently been renamed "The Fourth Trace of the Sun" and appears to be devoted to online gaming. Half of the people whose details were public were based in Shanghai. When contacted, the administrator of the group declined to comment.

One of the others named by the US, Ugly Gorilla, also appeared in a research report written last year.

Recently Ugly Gorilla, who was named by the US as Wang Dong, appears to have changed his screen name to "Say Goodbye to my youth", but his avatar on WeChat, a Chinese instant messaging system, remains a gorilla.

While his colleagues preferred to remain anonymous, he stamped some of his programs with his moniker, or left the letters "UG" in viruses he designed.

Researchers believe he has been active since 2004, when he asked Zhang Zhaozhong, a retired Chinese rear admiral, if China had "cyber troops" like the US.

"Cyber espionage is a new field and many of its practitioners are younger and less sophisticated than the seasoned intelligence professionals," said Jen Weedon, threat intelligence manager at FireEye, an American cybersecurity firm that has extensively documented Unit 61398.

"What you're seeing here are signs of amateurism and loose lips among lower-level officers."

Of the other hackers, few traces remain. Both Sun Kailiang (Jack Sun) and Gu Chunhui (KandyGoo) have wiped the web of any comments or posts. Huang Zhenyu's only remaining traces are technical comments on hacker forums.

However, researchers around the world have been carefully piecing together a picture of the lives of the hackers allegedly inside Unit 61398, collating every photograph and personal detail.

Last year, a three-year-long blog by a computer whizz who is now thought to have left the unit revealed that the hackers wore uniform at work and slept in dormitories at night.

The hacker, who was only named as Wang, posted some 625 blogs between 2006 and 2009. "Fate has made me feel that I am imprisoned," he wrote in his first entry on Sina.com, according to the Los Angeles Times.

"I want to escape."

Later, a school reunion left him feeling more depressed. "They all have a bright future. Some of them became lawyers; some went into property business or finance; some wrote programs for a commercial software company.

Compared with their handsome monthly income, I even felt ashamed to say hello to them," he wrote.

Additional reporting by Adam Wu

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!







So, yeh, best of the best among the elite Unit 61398, ask for help on hacking forum how to steal login password. Or how to write a spyware. He also ask for help to run games on his jail broken iPad. LOL. These guys sounds amateurish at best.

If the "fame" chinese cyber army is any good, they would at least manage these people better. Not having them blabbering online asking for hacking help at least. Or give them more decent training or education so they don't go online asking teenagers for hacking help! :D


Seriously.
 

Equation

Lieutenant General
.........

If the "fame" chinese cyber army is any good, they would at least manage these people better. Not having them blabbering online asking for hacking help at least. Or give them more decent training or education so they don't go online asking teenagers for hacking help! :D
Seriously.

And if the NSA were any good with managing their own people and personnel they wouldn't have Edward Snowden going to Russia and exposing so many of their spying activities to the world in the first place.
 

Ultra

Junior Member
And if the NSA were any good with managing their own people and personnel they wouldn't have Edward Snowden going to Russia and exposing so many of their spying activities to the world in the first place.

True, touche'. ;)

But there is a big difference, Edward Snowden did it out of conscience. The Chinese hackers here did it out of incompetence.
 

Equation

Lieutenant General
True, touche'. ;)

But there is a big difference, Edward Snowden did it out of conscience. The Chinese hackers here did it out of incompetence.

But Edward Snowden acted out of the incompetence of his bosses, meanwhile the Chinese hackers didn't. One's program has to be really messed up in order to have one of your own go against the authoritarian grain of the NSA.;)
 

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member

Guys, this conversation is devolving into China vs US rants and raves.

Get back on Topic to the particulars of the Chinese Cyber Warfare, news regarding it, and technical professional discussions regarding the same.

Otherwise the thread will be closed.

DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS MODERATION
 

Zool

Junior Member
This has been in the works for some time and certainly became a priority for China after the Snowden leaks. Article contains some comments from US Trade Representatives:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

22:01 27.02.2015(updated 02:01 28.02.2015)
4213371
Silicon Valley is in a panic following an announcement that China is considering sweeping counterterrorism legislation. The law would require tech companies to provide the Chinese government with NSA-like access to private data, terms the industry may be forced to accept if they want to do business in the world’s most populated country.

The Edward Snowden revelations about the American spying apparatus have numerous impacts. One of the latest is a decision by the Chinese government to terminate contracts with a number of major US-based technology brands. This could stem from news that the NSA installed spyware into the products of major US technology companies, thus using these brands as tools of US intelligence agencies.

But another recent side-effect of the Snowden documents could be a proposed Chinese counterterrorism law. While China seeks to shield itself from digital spying, the new law could give its own government even stronger capabilities in cyber surveillance.

1018761444.jpg

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!



The law’s current draft would require foreign tech firms to give the Chinese government “backdoor” security access, and to provide encryption keys. The law would also require companies to house servers within Chinese borders, giving law enforcement access to user data.

“It’s the equivalent of the Patriot Act on really, really strong steroids,” an anonymous US industry source told Reuters.

No matter the extent of the legislation, given the prevalence of the emerging Asian market. If tech companies want to be able to compete on global scale, they can’t ignore Chinese consumers.

“It’s a disaster for anyone doing business in China,” an industry source told Reuters. “You are no longer allowed a VPN that’s secure, you are no longer able to transmit financials securely, or to have any corporate secrets. By law, nothing is secure.”

1013603882.jpg

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!



US officials say that the Obama administration has already expressed its concerns with the law. They say that it places unfair burdens on foreign companies, but Beijing is expected to approve the legislation in the coming months.

“The Administration is aggressively working to have China walk back from these troubling regulations,” US Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement released on Thursday.

As part of their appeal, the US argues that such stringent cybersecurity policies could also have negative consequences on the Chinese economy.

“One unfortunate consequence of over-broad anti-terrorism policies is to potentially isolate China technologically from the rest of the world,” James Zimmerman, Chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, told Reuters. “And the end result of that may be to limit the country’s access to cutting-edge technology and innovation.”

1018788839.jpg

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!



Western nations, of course, have done their own share of meddling in the privacy policies of tech companies. Both the United States and Britain have encouraged Silicon Valley to provide encryption keys. Just last month, Prime Minister David Cameron and President Obama encouraged tech companies to provide intel in real-time in the name of national security.

“We need to work with these big companies,” Cameron told the BBC, “to make sure that we can keep people safe.”

This call was made soon after the terrorist attacks on Charlie Hebdo in Paris. China faces similar threats from religious extremists. Over the past two years, hundreds have died in the Xinjiang region, which the government blames on Islamist separatists.

And again, it may very well be the example set by the NSA which has encouraged China to adopt its own form of Big Brother.
 

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!




j10q1d1dte9ehu1lkzo1.jpg


The NSA and U.S. tech giants have
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
over government backdoors in encryption products lately, with the government arguing that backdoors are vital to national security, and the likes of Yahoo claiming it will make encryption pointless. Well, it looks the party line on backdoors changes pretty sharpish when China is involved.

As
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
reports, China is considering a counterterrorism law that would require technology firms to surrender encryption keys and install backdoors for security services — something that's not exactly dissimilar to the NSA activities revealed by Edward Snowden. But in an impressive piece of hypocrisy, the US is throwing up a fit over the proposed Chinese law.

Michael Froman, the US trade representative, claims that "the rules aren't about security — they are about protectionism and favoring Chinese companies...the administration is aggressively working to have China walk back from these troubling regulations."

But it's difficult to ignore the fact that the U.S. has undertaken nearly identical actions in the past — the
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
forces major tech companies to hand over access to their servers to the NSA, via a 'specially constructed backdoor', and in a well-publicized case, even forced
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
to hand over encryption keys and SSL keys.

The proposed Chinese regulations would make things easier for the Chinese government — encryption keys would be handed over as a matter of form, rather than on request — but the end result is basically identical. Something about chickens coming home to roost would be appropriate about now. [
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
]
 

Zetageist

Junior Member
PLA cyberunit targeting Taiwan named

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


CYBERWAR SCHOOL?MND and MIB sources say the PLA’s General Staff Department’s Third Department has units in the guise of research centers and telcommunication labs
By Lo Tien-pin and Jason Pan / Staff reporters

Senior intelligence officials have identified the specific Chinese military outfit and technical surveillance unit tasked with cyberwarfare against Taiwan and say it is located on the campus of Wuhan University, in Wuhan, Hubei Province.

They said the Wuhan University-based unit is actually the Sixth Bureau of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) General Staff Department’s (GSD) Third Department.

The Sixth Bureau is engaged in technical aspects of surveillance and intelligence-gathering on important Taiwanese agencies, intercepting telecommunications signals, hacking computers and mobile phone service networks, and satellite imagery reconnaissance against Taiwan, according to recent statements and interviews with Military Intelligence Bureau (MIB) and Ministry of National Defense (MND) officials.

“China’s espionage activities and intelligence-gathering against Taiwan and other countries is always hidden under the guise of academic research centers, non-profit foundations or private sector companies,” said a ministry official who declined to be named.

“It is the same for the PLA’s GSD Sixth Bureau. Its units have network specialists, computer technicians, analysts and trained hackers working in offices at Wuhan University,” he said.

“These offices are installed on campus under the cover of research centers and telecommunication laboratories,” he said.

Other nations who have come under cyberattack and digital information theft have also reported that Chinese cyberarmy units are operating inside university campuses.

“The aim is to conduct state espionage work under the facade of academic research,” the defense ministry official said.

Foreign and Taiwanese defense experts said the Sixth Bureau is one of the 12 bureaus under the PLA’s GSD Third Department (abbreviated as “3PLA”), whose mandates and functions fall under the framework of technical reconnaissance and digital information warfare.

PLA Unit 61398 in Shanghai’s Pudong District, believed to be responsible for the hacking and theft of business information as well as designing malware attacks against the US and other Western countries, is part of the same agency network under 3PLA’s 2nd Bureau.

The unit gained widespread attention after the US Department of Justice on May 19 last year indicted five PLA officers with conducting economic cyberespionage against US companies, including Westinghouse Electric, US Steel, Allegheny Technologies and Alcoa, as well as the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union.

The five men were identified as working for Unit 61398.

Figures compiled by the National Security Bureau and other government departments in Taiwan show that in 2013, the NSB came under Chinese cyberwarfare attack 7.22 million times, the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau (MJIB) came under 1.56 million cyberattacks and the defense ministry faced 1.01 million attacks.

According to a senior MIB officer, China’s surveillance and espionage activities against Taiwan can be divided into two main areas: human intelligence and signals intelligence.

The human intelligence programs against Taiwan are mostly directed by its Ministry of State Security (also known as guoan, 國安部), along with the United Work Front Department, which is part of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Committee, the MIB officer said.

These programs are aimed at recruiting or enticing Taiwanese officials and agents for information, the officer said.

However, signals intelligence programs against Taiwan that monitor telecommunications, radar, radio and other signals are under the command of the GSD Third Department, he said.

Additional reporting by staff writer
 
Top