China Behind 96% of All Cyber-Espionage Data Breaches, Verizon Report Claims 96
colinneagle writes "Verizon's 2013 Data Breach Investigation Report is out and includes data gathered by its own forensics team and data breach info from 19 partner organizations worldwide. China was involved in 96% of all espionage data-breach incidents, most often targeting manufacturing, professional and transportation industries, the report claims. The assets China targeted within those industries included laptop/desktop, file server, mail server and directory server, in order to steal credentials, internal organization data, trade secrets and system info. A whopping 95% of the attacks started with phishing to get a toehold into their victim's systems. The report states, 'Phishing techniques have become much more sophisticated, often targeting specific individuals (spear phishing) and using tactics that are harder for IT to control. For example, now that people are suspicious of email, phishers are using phone calls and social networking.' It is unknown who the nation-state actors were in the other 4% of breaches, which the report says 'may mean that other threat groups perform their activities with greater stealth and subterfuge. But it could also mean that China is, in fact, the most active source of national and industrial espionage in the world today.'"
The report also notes that financially-motivated incidents primarily came from the U.S. and various Eastern European countries.
Re:I must admit a begrudging respect for China (Score:4, Insightful)
You're drawing a false distinction between China's government and it's industries. Companies in China essentially *are* part of the government.
Russians and Eastern Europeans on vacation? (Score:2, Insightful)
Sorry. Just a little skeptical here. I don't doubt that China does its share, but I'm guessing that it's pretty easy to make it look like an attack is coming from China even if it originates from Boise, Idaho.
Re:I must admit a begrudging respect for China (Score:5, Insightful)
Your whole reply was pure speculation, unless the government has been giving you the memos, stop reading Mother Jones. You whole argument is that (1) you don't know what the government is doing, (2) therefore it is lying to you. Brilliant, Einstein.
Re:I must admit a begrudging respect for China (Score:4, Insightful)
People joke and laugh about Chinese aggression, but please never forget, China is the oldest nation on the planet and arguably the second largest in size (depending on definition).
They have arguably existed in continuous (but evolving) national form since approximately 200 BC -- possibly longer if you consider the Qin takeover a civil war and treat the dynasties as more western city states.
You don't last 2000+ years as a nation without a long term plan.
I don't want to be fearmongering about Asian cultures -- but it is important to pay a potential foe respect where it's due. China knows what they're doing.
Also don't forget modern China is mostly populated and run by Han Chinese. Many of the earlier tribes of China were driven out by Han expansion and presently populate Southeast Asia and Japan. In claiming Tibet the government has effectively declared it lebensraum. Tibetans are already a minority in their own land.
Re:I must admit a begrudging respect for China (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't last 2000+ years as a nation without a long term plan.
China has fallen apart, and been glued back together, many times in the last 2000+ years. Emperor/Chinese party gets too greedy, peasants revolt, place falls apart for a few centuries, new peasant leader comes along and makes himself emperor (e.g. Mao) and it stays glued together for some time, until the cycle repeats.
I'll buy that they're thinking longer term than the US, but that's also true of a hyperactive three year old. No country thinks 2000 years ahead. BTW Egypt has been around a lot longer and has at least as good of a claim to continuity.