The National Security Agency (NSA) -- tasked with protecting American computer systems -- apparently fell asleep on the job. The latest flimsy cover story: The NSA allegedly watched North Korea hack Sony for over four years, yet did nothing about it, because North Korean hackers are patient.
It gets worse: According to the latest round of leaked Snowden documents, China -- North Korea's BFF -- also hacked U.S. military computers and stole designs of the flying lemon F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, and troves of other sensitive documents. This is the very same China recently asked by the U.S. for help in efforts to stop North Korea from hacking into American networks.
In IT Blogwatch, bloggers want value for their money.
Filling in for our humble blogwatcher Richi Jennings, is a humbler Stephen Glasskeys.
Jeremy Kirk doesn't trust the crewman wearing a red shirt:
The [NSA] has worked for at least four years to infiltrate networks inside North Korea and those in China and Malaysia favored by the countryís hackers...citing former U.S. and foreign officials and a newly disclosed NSA document published by Der Spiegel.
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The revelation explains why the U.S. quickly blamed North Korea for the attacks despite widespread skepticism from the computer security community, which said only circumstantial evidence pointed to the country's involvement. MORE
Sean Gallagher recounts the story of how his second cousin's college roommate hacked North Korea:
A new wave of documents from Edward Snowden's cache of National Security Agency data...demonstrate how the agency has used its network exploitation capabilities...to co-opt other organizations' hacks for intelligence collection and other purposes.
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In a [Q & A] posting to NSA's intranet, an NSA employee recounted a "fifth party" collection that occurred when the NSA hacked into South Korea's exploit of North Korean computers--and ended up collecting data from North Korea's hack of someone else. MORE
But David Meyer counts to one hundred million:
Chinese army hackers apparently caused more than $100 million worth of damage to U.S. Department of Defense networks, according to documents from the Edward Snowden cache. MORE
And Philip Dorling reveals $100 million is the tip of the iceberg:
Chinese spies stole key design information about [the new] Joint Strike Fighter, according to top secret documents disclosed by former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden.
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According to a top secret NSA presentation, Chinese cyber spies have stolen..."many terabytes of data" relating to the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) - also known as the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II. MORE
Jon Fingas discovers why Sony won't give the NSA a straw:
[The NSA] touts that it can "drink your milkshake" (There Will Be Blood style) if you dare attack American government computers. When China hacked the Department of Defense in 2009, the NSA not only pinpointed the source of attack, but broke into China's intelligence network and monitored the country's spying efforts. MORE
Peter N. M. Hansteen checks source code, line by line:
Apparently OpenSSH isn't backdoored as is, but the NSA wants to install their backdoored sshd on your system MORE
Meanwhile, Nicholas Kristof is fascinated:
Fascinating: the US hacked into North Korean computers to spy on them spying on Sony MORE
You have been reading IT Blogwatch by Richi Jennings and Stephen Glasskeys, who curate the best bloggy bits, finest forums, and weirdest websites…so you don't have to. Catch the key commentary from around the Web every morning. Hatemail may be directed to @RiCHi or itbw@richi.uk. Opinions expressed may not represent those of Computerworld. Ask your doctor before reading. Your mileage may vary. E&OE.
