Hacker attack underlines need to boost cybersecurity

A backdoor program-aided cyberattack on Wuhan Earthquake Monitoring Center in Hubei province by overseas hacker groups with foreign government links has once again underscored the need for China to beef up its cyber capabilities to block similar attacks and fight cybercrimes.

Backdoor programs are applications that allow cybercriminals to access computers remotely. These can be installed in both software and hardware components.

The Wuhan Municipal Emergency Management Bureau, which is in charge of the earthquake monitoring center, said on Wednesday that the National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center and internet security services provider 360 Security Technology recently notified the bureau that part of the center's network equipment, used for collecting data for early warning, was attacked by foreign organizations.

The center reported the situation to local police and closed off the involved network equipment at the front-end station in time, the bureau said in a statement, adding that it reserves the right to pursue a case against perpetrators of the crime.

The bureau and the center are firmly against any form of cyberattack, whether conducted by an organization or an individual, and any behavior that harms earthquake monitoring infrastructure will be investigated and held accountable under the law, the statement added.

The Wuhan Municipal Public Security Bureau also issued a statement on Wednesday, saying its Jiang­han branch received the cyberattack report from the earthquake monitoring center on Tuesday. Such attacks pose a serious threat to national security and the police have filed a case for investigation, it said.

According to preliminary probe, the attack was launched by "overseas hacker organizations with government backgrounds".

The police said they have carried out technical analysis of the backdoor program samples extracted, showing that the program was capable of controlling and stealing seismic intensity data collected by the network equipment at the front-end station of the earthquake monitoring center.

At a regular news conference on Wednesday, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning condemned the cyberattack. Such attacks are a serious threat to China's national security and China will take necessary measures to safeguard its cybersecurity, she said.

According to a report from Yuyuantantian, an online news account affiliated to China Media Group, traceability analysis shows that the overseas hacker organizations behind the Wuhan cyberattack are from the United States.

The report quoted an earthquake monitoring expert as saying that the speed of seismic waves varies when the underground medium and structure through which they pass are different.

The underground structure in a certain area can be deduced by obtaining relevant data from the seismic monitoring center. For example, the data can help detect a large hole in the ground, or even concrete structures such as a military base or a command post.

Cyberattacks are among the most prominent ways to gain intelligence. William Burns, director of the CIA, said recently at a security conference in Colorado that the agency has made progress in rebuilding spy networks in China, and they are working very hard to make sure they have a very strong human intelligence capability to complement what they can acquire through other methods, media reported.

Apart from detecting the cyberattack in Wuhan, the National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center and 360 Security Technology have released several reports about US intelligence agencies conducting cyberattacks on targets in China in recent years.

In May, they revealed the CIA's global espionage operations in a technical report, which suggests cyberattacks on targets in China and other countries. The targets included key information infrastructure, the aerospace industry, scientific research institutions, petroleum and petrochemical industries, large Internet companies and government agencies.