Hackers don’t just hack small accounts like Hospital data or Software data. They get into big stuff like military and warplane data too!
According to Japanese Defense Ministry hackers have most probably accessed sensitive data relating to military aircraft, missiles, and nuclear power plant designs and safety systems.
The news in detail
Mitsubishi Heavy–Japan’s largest defense contractor is best known in America for manufacturing the surface-to-air Patriot missile.–In August it found out that multiple computers were infected with a Trojan application. Further investigation showed that the information had been sent outside the company’s computer network, clearly indicating an outsider’s involvement.
The computers were located in 11 different places. Some were placed in sensitive areas like the Kobe and Nagasaki shipyards that are into submarines and destroyers constructions. A few others were located at the Nagoya facility that manufactures guided missile systems. The nuclear data that was stolen included anti-quake measures.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was reluctant to share this info at first. It kept the Japanese authorities in dark stating that its military information was safe and that all security measures were followed. Initially the company said that the attackers were caught early on but later contradicted their own statement saying that data had been compromised.
Statement issued by the company
“The company recently confirmed unintended transferring of some information on the company’s products and technologies between servers within the company,” said Mitsubishi Heavy in a statement. “Based on the finding, the company investigated the incident further and recognized the possibility of some data leakage from the server in question.”
Other recent military data breaches
Lockheed Martin, which manufactures the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II fighter aircraft, was a victim of military data theft recently. The Lockheed hack was done by using information stolen earlier from RSA Security. RSA is the branch of EMC that produces the SecurID two-factor authentication token used by thousands of contractors and corporations to secure their networks.
What are the Tokyo Police doing about it?
Mitsubishi Heavy has given a complaint to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department with details about damage done to its computer system in late September. The police are looking into computer records to find out the source of the data.
Protect your confidential data with Alertsec
Alertsec Xpress offers a customizable data encryption software solution from Checkpoint, the industry leader in encryption software (former Pointsec). Alertsec has come up with a web based encryption service that helps in deployment and management of PC encryption.
The need of a Data encryption software and recovery software is felt by big and small companies in today’s vulnerable data world. The threat could have simply been reduced to an insurance matter by a mere investment of $13/month. Certainly a small price to pay compared to what can happen if you lose confidential or sensitive data. Alertsec Xpress offers a very good and easy-to-use laptop security service that includes more than the traditional software licensing model.
