Google Earth: China's War On Google

I don't approve of Wiki-Leaks, or of the NY Times, and I certainly don't like their on-going marriage of convenience, but I have to say their joint report today on China's attacks on Google (and the Internet) was ... damned interesting:

As China ratcheted up the pressure on Google to censor its Internet searches last year, the American Embassy sent a secret cable to Washington detailing one reason top Chinese leaders had become so obsessed with the Internet search company: they were Googling themselves

The May 18, 2009, cable, titled “Google China Paying Price for Resisting Censorship,” quoted a well-placed source as saying that Li Changchun, a member of China’s top ruling body, the Politburo Standing Committee, and the country’s senior propaganda official, was taken aback to discover that he could conduct Chinese-language searches on Google’s main international Web site. When Mr. Li typed his name into the search engine atgoogle.com, he found “results critical of him.”

That cable from American diplomats was one of many made public by WikiLeaks that portray China’s leadership as nearly obsessed with the threat posed by the Internet to their grip on power — and, the reverse, by the opportunities it offered them, through hacking, to obtain secrets stored in computers of its rivals, especially the United States.

Extensive hacking operations suspected of originating in China, including one leveled at Google, are a central theme in the cables. The operations began earlier and were aimed at a wider array of American government and military data than generally known, including on the computers of United States diplomats involved in climate change talks with China.

China's government says the hacking is being done by freelance "patriotic hackers" whom I have discussed/made fun of before. But, let's get real. Of course the Red Chinese government is behind this. Only diplomatic niceties prevent us from saying otherwise.

As with the other Wiki-leaks State Department docs, I don't like that Julian Asssssange has taken upon himself to put this stuff on the Web. But, the Google story, like many others, is one that really ought to have been told much more extensively than it already has. For many American elites (best represented by Thomas Friedman) China has become an object of desire and envy, as they are awe-struck by that country's rapid modernization, and secretly jealous of the central government's ability to override property rights and individual liberty in pursuit of its policies. Stories like this, even in the context of an outrageous attack on America's national security, are a necessary reality check.

Alt-Google Earth Malware

Some enterprising Canadians - hired by the Dalai Lama to find out why his group's computers seemed to be infected by viruses - have stumbled on to (ahem) Something Big: Vast Spy System Loots Computers in 103 Countries:

A vast electronic spying operation has infiltrated computers and has stolen documents from hundreds of government and private offices around the world, including those of the Dalai Lama, Canadian researchers have concluded.

Please tell me that the CIA/DNI/NSA/ETC knew about this. I'm betting they didn't, but that the pros at the Pentagon probably did. And you'll never guess where the computers are located.

In a report to be issued this weekend, the researchers said that the system was being controlled from computers based almost exclusively in China, but that they could not say conclusively that the Chinese government was involved.

...

Although the Canadian researchers said that most of the computers behind the spying were in China, they cautioned against concluding that China’s government was involved. The spying could be a nonstate, for-profit operation, for example, or one run by private citizens in China known as “patriotic hackers.”

That last bit must be in there for politeness' sake. Of course, the gov't was involved. No one is "patriotic' enough to set up this sort of system.

Their sleuthing opened a window into a broader operation that, in less than two years, has infiltrated at least 1,295 computers in 103 countries, including many belonging to embassies, foreign ministries and other government offices, as well as the Dalai Lama’s Tibetan exile centers in India, Brussels, London and New York.

The researchers, who have a record of detecting computer espionage, said they believed that in addition to the spying on the Dalai Lama, the system, which they called GhostNet, was focused on the governments of South Asian and Southeast Asian countries.

Quick! Someone call Lynn Stewart and the ACLU! Civil liberties are being crushed for real this time!

The malware is remarkable both for its sweep — in computer jargon, it has not been merely “phishing” for random consumers’ information, but “whaling” for particular important targets — and for its Big Brother-style capacities. It can, for example, turn on the camera and audio-recording functions of an infected computer, enabling monitors to see and hear what goes on in a room. The investigators say they do not know if this facet has been employed.

The researchers were able to monitor the commands given to infected computers and to see the names of documents retrieved by the spies, but in most cases the contents of the stolen files have not been determined. Working with the Tibetans, however, the researchers found that specific correspondence had been stolen and that the intruders had gained control of the electronic mail server computers of the Dalai Lama’s organization.

Those darn patriotic hackers! What sort of mischief will they get into next?

As the world gets farther on-line, it would seem that our greatest secrets might have to re-enter the analogue world. Much of the US's military might is dependent on computers and satellite technology that may not be as secure as we like. We may never be able to leave homing pigeons and semaphores behind.