South Korea reckons mystery hackers cracked open advanced weapons servers

The South Korea Ministry of National Defense says 10 of its internal PCs have been compromised by North Korea unknown hackers. Korea's Dong-A Ilbo reports that the targeted machines belonged to the ministry's Defense Acquisition Program Administration, the office in charge of military procurement. The report notes that the …

[Anonymous Coward]

Attribution is going to very difficult on this one. There are several other countries that would be interested in the contents of those computers. And that's before identifying commercial interests that might want a peek.

[Persona]

True but if you had a tad acrimonious relationship with a neighbouring country and you found this place where they stored information about all their advanced weapons purchases would you take a peek if you could? Of course you would. It would be criminally stupid not to.

[Jude Bradley]

China anyone?

[Povl H. Pedersen]

North Korea is supposed by China, so anything stolen by North Korea will likely end up China as well

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you mean "Supported"

But I almost agree.

China helping Nork hackers and using them as an "arms-length" agency??

[hellwig]

Makes you wonder why the western world doesn't sanction China for supporting sanctioned North Korea. Oh wait, money.

[Joe User]

If the western world did, the store shelves would be almost empty because the western corporations have shifted nearly all of their production to mainland China.

(Where is the "hoisted with his own petard" icon?)

[robidy]

Donald Trump for all his faults is doing just that with trade tariffs on Chinese imports...AND profiting from said tariffs.

[Blofeld's Cat]

Hmm ...

'... the breached machines would have held information on purchases for things such as "next-generation fighter jets," ...'

Beancounter: [Waves printout] "OK lads, I enjoy a joke as much as anyone else, but who ordered all those F-35B aircraft?"

[Robert Carnegie]

Hmm. DAPA.

Is that like DARPA, but instead of Research Projects, it is just Purchasing?

To be honest, I know the answer is "no", but it struck me.

[W.S.Gosset]

Good heavens

Has anyone identified a possible suspect?

[robidy]

Re: Good heavens

China trying to derail Trumps Korean peace deal....would be handy for thsm if the norks copped the blame...would also benefit Russia.

[W.S.Gosset]

Re: Good heavens

Good heavens, someone blithely missing the irony.

Well, on that same basis:

Bit late for that: North Korea's already derailed it, AND copped the blame.

.

(except for various one-eyed ranters who switched from:

* screaming at trump for talking to nk at all, to

* screaming at trump for not immediately doing what nk demanded, instead playing nk's (and china's) own brinksmanship game back at them ("render unto caesar" -- works well), to

* screaming at trump for talking to nk at all when, instead of gameover, they came back to the table (as any realpolitik person foresaw), to

* screaming at trump for not doing what nk demanded II, to

* screaming at trump when nk did the dirty as expected

* screaming at trump when he walked away and left them hanging

leaving nk... universally diminished globally, to the point where even china's having second thoughts

)

[MonsieurTM]

Oh come on, surely it must be everyone's bogeyman-du-jour, Russia!