Hackers claim police information stolen in China's biggest data breach - The Bharat Express News
Hackers claim police information stolen in China’s biggest data breach
By The Bharat Express News -July 4, 2022079
(Bloomberg) – Unknown hackers have claimed to have stolen data on up to a billion Chinese residents after hacking into a Shanghai police database, in what industry experts are calling the world’s biggest data breach. cybersecurity in the country’s history.
Bloomberg’s Most Read
The person or group claiming the attack has offered to sell more than 23 terabytes of data stolen from the database, including names, addresses, birthplaces, national ID cards, phone numbers and information about criminal cases, according to an anonymous post on an online cybercrime forum. the week. The unidentified hacker demanded 10 bitcoins, worth around $200,000.
The scale of the alleged leak sent shockwaves through the Chinese security community, sparking speculation about the credibility of the allegation and how it could have taken place. Zhao Changpeng, founder and chief executive of cryptocurrency exchange Binance, tweeted on Monday that the company detected the violation of one billion resident records of “an Asian country”, without specifying which one, and had since increased verification procedures for potentially affected users.
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Shanghai authorities have not publicly responded to the alleged hack. Officials from the city’s police and the Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s internet watchdog, did not immediately respond to faxed requests for comment.
Read more: The Chinese company that accused the NSA of hacking has global ambitions
The United States and other countries have repeatedly identified China as one of the world’s biggest sources of cybercriminals, who they say infiltrate systems on behalf of national agencies in search of valuable data or intellectual property.
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The story continues
Domestic violations, however, are rarely disclosed due to a lack of transparent reporting mechanisms. In 2016, personal information of dozens of Communist Party officials and industry figures, from Jack Ma to Wang Jianlin, was reportedly exposed on Twitter, in one of the world’s largest leaks of sensitive information online. country at the time. In 2020, Twitter-like service Weibo Corp. said hackers claimed to have stolen the account information of more than 538 million of its users, although sensitive data such as passwords was not disclosed. And this year, tens of thousands of apparently hacked files from China’s remote Xinjiang region have provided new evidence of abuse of mostly Muslim Uyghurs, a rights group says.
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The latest alleged incident has again underscored the challenges Beijing faces as it collects data on hundreds of millions of people while stepping up surveillance of sensitive online content. Under Chinese law, exposing personal information can result in jail time.
It’s unclear how the alleged cyberattackers in this month’s breach gained access to Shanghai police servers. A popular theory circulated online among cybersecurity experts was that the breach involved a third-party cloud infrastructure partner. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Tencent Holdings Ltd. and Huawei Technologies Co. are among the largest external cloud services in the country.
By The Bharat Express News -July 4, 2022079
(Bloomberg) – Unknown hackers have claimed to have stolen data on up to a billion Chinese residents after hacking into a Shanghai police database, in what industry experts are calling the world’s biggest data breach. cybersecurity in the country’s history.
Bloomberg’s Most Read
The person or group claiming the attack has offered to sell more than 23 terabytes of data stolen from the database, including names, addresses, birthplaces, national ID cards, phone numbers and information about criminal cases, according to an anonymous post on an online cybercrime forum. the week. The unidentified hacker demanded 10 bitcoins, worth around $200,000.
The scale of the alleged leak sent shockwaves through the Chinese security community, sparking speculation about the credibility of the allegation and how it could have taken place. Zhao Changpeng, founder and chief executive of cryptocurrency exchange Binance, tweeted on Monday that the company detected the violation of one billion resident records of “an Asian country”, without specifying which one, and had since increased verification procedures for potentially affected users.
ALSO READ China reports 268 new COVID cases as of July 1, up from 245 the day before
Shanghai authorities have not publicly responded to the alleged hack. Officials from the city’s police and the Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s internet watchdog, did not immediately respond to faxed requests for comment.
Read more: The Chinese company that accused the NSA of hacking has global ambitions
The United States and other countries have repeatedly identified China as one of the world’s biggest sources of cybercriminals, who they say infiltrate systems on behalf of national agencies in search of valuable data or intellectual property.
ALSO READ Don Lemon: Republicans should be treated by media as a danger to society, should not be 'coddled'
The story continues
Domestic violations, however, are rarely disclosed due to a lack of transparent reporting mechanisms. In 2016, personal information of dozens of Communist Party officials and industry figures, from Jack Ma to Wang Jianlin, was reportedly exposed on Twitter, in one of the world’s largest leaks of sensitive information online. country at the time. In 2020, Twitter-like service Weibo Corp. said hackers claimed to have stolen the account information of more than 538 million of its users, although sensitive data such as passwords was not disclosed. And this year, tens of thousands of apparently hacked files from China’s remote Xinjiang region have provided new evidence of abuse of mostly Muslim Uyghurs, a rights group says.
ALSO READ Hoover Dam transformer explodes; no one hurt
The latest alleged incident has again underscored the challenges Beijing faces as it collects data on hundreds of millions of people while stepping up surveillance of sensitive online content. Under Chinese law, exposing personal information can result in jail time.
It’s unclear how the alleged cyberattackers in this month’s breach gained access to Shanghai police servers. A popular theory circulated online among cybersecurity experts was that the breach involved a third-party cloud infrastructure partner. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Tencent Holdings Ltd. and Huawei Technologies Co. are among the largest external cloud services in the country.
