Getting called out by the Obama administration wasn’t enough of a deterrent for Unit 61398, the cyberattack unit of the People’s Liberation Army of China, because apparently they’re at it again, working to pilfer information from private company and public government data stores.
The New York Times is reporting that Unit 61398 has resumed operations and is actively engaged in hacking into any U.S. systems that might hold information considered to be of use for the People’s Republic of China.
Security firm Mandiant told the Times “that the Chinese hackers had stopped their attacks after they were exposed in February and removed their spying tools from the organizations they had infiltrated. But over the past two months, they have gradually begun attacking the same victims from new servers and have reinserted many of the tools that enable them to seek out data without detection.
“They are now operating at 60 percent to 70 percent of the level they were working at before, according to a study by Mandiant requested by The New York Times,” the article reported.
If accurate, then it’s clear that the U.S. is going to have to step up its game when it comes to cybersecurity, particularly organizations that have data related to trade secrets or, more disturbingly, infrastructure plans – both targets of Chinese hackers.
Even if this isn’t the PLA, someone is hacking these systems, and it’s time to stop treating cybersecurity like a game.
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