Washington, June 3(ANI): Chinese hackers enjoyed months of access to the personal Google emails of senior US officials and human rights activists, according to a US computer security expert.
Google had on Wednesday said that hackers based in China tried to break into hundreds of Google mail accounts. The company later claimed that the hackers’ “goal” was to eavesdrop on the officials “to monitor the content of the users’ emails”.
The first details of the attack emerged in February on the blog of Mila Parkour, a pseudonymous computer security expert who found a “spear phishing” email on the systems of one of her clients, The Telegraph reports.he had alerted Google after which they made their official announcement.
An example described by Parkour appeared to originate from the US State Department and contained link to a document named “Draft US-China Joint tatement”.
In fact, when clicked, the link summoned a facsimile of the Gmail login page.he bogus page asked targets to enter their password, granting the attackers full access to their email account. Google said the attackers then changed settings so that all incoming messages would be forwarded to them.
The security breach was revealed as the Pentagon warned that the US might retaliate with military force against countries that sabotage its computers.
Google said that the latest attack was believed to have been executed from the city of Jinan.
China, however, claims that the hacking is not state-sponsored, said the allegations are “completely unfounded and made with ulterior motives.” (ANI)
The office of Victorian Deputy Premier Peter Ryan won’t comment on reports a ministerial adviser has been under surveillance by the police watchdog.
A ministerial adviser to Mr Ryan has been named in reports in The Age and Herald Sun newspapers as a target of surveillance by the Office of Police Integrity (OPI).
Mr Ryan, also Police Minister, is on compassionate leave from parliament and was unable to be contacted on Saturday, but his spokeswoman said the OPI operated without influence by politicians.
‘Matters to do with the OPI are strictly matters for the OPI,’ she said.
‘They have the powers they have, they do as they do, we are outside of that process,’ the spokeswoman said.
The OPI on Friday admitted they had Sir Ken Jones, one of Victoria’s most senior policeman, under surveillance following complaints.
A media report had earlier revealed the surveillance was underway, and Sir Ken’s wife and supporters had also been targeted.
Sir Ken had a rocky relationship with the police Chief Commissioner, Simon Overland.
Mr Overland forced Sir Ken to go on leave three months early after Sir Ken announced his resignation in May.
Victoria’s Police Association has said Mr Overland used his friendship with OPI’s deputy director, Paul Jevtovic, to influence the OPI to commence the investigation.
It is thought the ministerial adviser allegedly bugged by the OPI was a supporter of Sir Ken.
Chief Commissioner not keen to answer questions about OPI surveillance targeting Sir Ken Jones
ffice of Victorian Deputy Premier Peter Ryan is refusing to comment on reports an adviser to the minister has been under surveillance by the police watchdog.
Mr Ryan, also Police Minister, is on compassionate leave from parliament and was unable to be contacted today, but his spokeswoman said the OPI operated without influence by politicians.
“Matters to do with the OPI are strictly matters for the OPI,” she said.
“They have the powers they have, they do as they do, we are outside of that process,” the spokeswoman said.
The OPI yesterday admitted they had Sir Ken Jones, one of Victoria’s most senior policeman, under surveillance following complaints.
A media report had earlier revealed the surveillance was underway, and Sir Ken’s wife and supporters had also been targeted.
Sir Ken had a rocky relationship with the police Chief Commissioner, Simon Overland.
Mr Overland forced Sir Ken to go on leave three months early after Sir Ken announced his resignation in May.
Victoria’s Police Association has said Mr Overland used his friendship with OPI’s deputy director, Paul Jevtovic, to influence the OPI to commence the investigation.
It is thought the ministerial adviser allegedly bugged by the OPI was a supporter of Sir Ken.
WASHINGTON – Federal regulators on Thursday expanded their civil insider-trading charges against a chemist with the Food and Drug Administration accused of using confidential FDA information on pending drug approvals to profit from trades of drug companies’ stock.
Cheng Yi Liang is facing both civil and criminal charges of running an insider trading scheme starting in November 2007. He and his son were arrested in March on charges including securities fraud and wire fraud.
The Securities and Exchange Commission said Thursday it filed a revised civil lawsuit against Liang, alleging he illegally traded in advance of a public announcement on FDA approval of XenoPort Inc.’s Horizant. That was the 28th announcement the SEC says Liang traded ahead of, in addition to the 27 cited in the agency’s suit filed in federal court in Greenbelt, Md., on March 29.
The agency’s revised suit “shows Liang had one more illegal trade in the pipeline when we charged him,” SEC spokesman John Nester said in a statement. “That trade was not expected to pay off until after we put a stop to his fraudulent scheme.”
Horizant was developed to treat restless leg syndrome. Liang made more than $126,000 in profits on XenoPort’s stock, the SEC said. He is accused of making a total $3.6 million in the trading scheme.
Liang’s lawyer, Andrew Carter, didn’t immediately return a telephone call seeking comment Thursday.
The SEC is seeking unspecified restitution and fines against Liang.
Liang looked up the status of the FDA’s review of Horizant on a confidential database at least 52 times between Jan. 6 and March 24, the SEC said. He bought 43,000 shares of XenoPort in accounts in other people’s names in February and March.
The announcement of the approval of Horizant came on April 6, about a week after Liang was charged by the SEC and federal prosecutors. It boosted the price of XenoPort stock by 56 percent, according to the SEC.
The new SEC complaint adds an eighth brokerage account to those it says Liang used to avoid getting caught. That one was in the name of his father, the agency said.
The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that the government has expanded its investigation of insider trading at the FDA to cover other government employees besides Liang. The Journal cited unidentified people familiar with the matter.
“2011 has really lit up the boards in terms of data breaches,’’ said Josh Shaul, chief technology officer at Application Security, a New York-based company that is one of the largest database security software makers. “The list of targets just grows and grows.’’
Lockheed Martin Corp. said in a statement Saturday that it detected the May 21 attack “almost immediately’’ and took countermeasures.
“Our systems remain secure; no customer, program or employee personal data has been compromised,’’ the Bethesda, Md.-based company said. Neither Lockheed Martin nor federal agencies would reveal specifics of the attack, or its origins. Company spokeswoman Jennifer Whitlow declined to comment further on the case Sunday.
This isn’t the first time Lockheed Martin has been targeted. Nearly four years ago, officials revealed that hackers had breached Lockheed’s Joint Strike Fighter program. Officials said no classified information about the military program was compromised, but heightened protections were added.
Analysts said the latest attack would likely spur rival defense contractors like Northrop Grumman Corp., Raytheon Co., General Dynamics Corp. and Boeing Co. to take additional steps to safeguard their systems.
“I guarantee you every major defense contractor is on double alert this weekend, watching what’s going on and making sure they’re not the next to fall victim,’’ Shaul said.
Boeing declined to comment on the company’s network security measures. Northrop Grumman spokesman Randy Belote said in an e-mailed statement that “we do not comment on whether or not Northrop Grumman is or has been a target for cyber intrusions,’’ adding that the company “continuously monitors and proactively strengthens the security of our networks.’’
