N. Korea Suspected of Global Cyber Attack

U.S., South Korean Government Web Sites Affected

(AP)  A widespread computer attack that began July 4 knocked out the Web sites of the Treasury Department, the Secret Service and other U.S. government agencies, according to officials inside and outside the government.

Sites in South Korea were also affected, and South Korean intelligence officials believe the attack was carried out by North Korean or pro-Pyongyang forces.

The U.S. government Web sites, which also included those of the Federal Trade Commission and the Transportation Department, were all down at varying points over the holiday weekend and into this week. South Korean Internet sites began experiencing problems Tuesday.

U.S. officials refused to publicly discuss details of the cyber attack.

But South Korea's National Intelligence Service, the nation's main spy agency, told a group of South Korean lawmakers Wednesday it believes that North Korea or North Korean sympathizers in the South "were behind" the attacks, according to an aide to one of the lawmakers briefed on the information.

The aide spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the information. The National Intelligence Service - South Korea's main spy agency - said it couldn't immediately confirm the report, but it said it was cooperating with American authorities.

Amy Kudwa, spokeswoman for the Homeland Security Department, said the agency's U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team issued a notice to federal departments and other partner organizations about the problems and "advised them of steps to take to help mitigate against such attacks."

Others familiar with the U.S. outage, which is called a denial of service attack, said the fact that the government Web sites were still being affected three days after it began signaled an unusually lengthy and sophisticated attack.

Two government officials acknowledged that the Treasury and Secret Service sites were brought down, and said the agencies were working with their Internet service provider to resolve the problem. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the matter.

Ben Rushlo, director of Internet technologies at Keynote Systems, said problems with the Transportation Department site began Saturday and continued until Monday, while the FTC site was down Sunday and Monday.

Keynote Systems is a mobile and Web site monitoring company based in San Mateo, California. The company publishes data detailing outages on Web sites, including 40 government sites it watches.

According to Rushlo, the Transportation Web site was "100 percent down" for two days, so that no Internet users could get through to it. The FTC site, meanwhile, started to come back online late Sunday, but even on Tuesday Internet users still were unable to get to the site 70 percent of the time.

Web sites of major South Korean government agencies, including the presidential Blue House and the Defense Ministry, and some banking sites were paralyzed Tuesday. An initial investigation found that many personal computers were infected with a virus ordering them to visit major official Web sites in South Korea and the U.S. at the same time, Korea Information Security Agency official Shin Hwa-su said.

[dahizzle]

>>>When will obama admit that his policy of direct talks without preconditions with terrorist regimes has failed horribly?>>>

You expect him to get things fixed in 6 months? Bush wasn't even done reading 'My Pet Goat' 6 months into his term.....

[dahizzle]

Nuke 'em. No one will ever miss 'em.

[Joe_NY_15]

by slownewsday_05 July 8, 2009 10:06 AM PDT
If Bush were really in it to prevent genocide instead of to make his oil buddies happy, he would've done something about Darfur.
_____________________________

Darfur ???? what do you think we are, the world's police ? actually, we had a war with Iraq in 1990-91, and Iraq surrendered....there was surrender agreements and other restrictions that HAD to be kept....they weren't kept by Saddam.....secondly, he had used WMD's in the past and had programs to develope WMD's further....this situation is much different then Darfur, which was basically an African Tribal war....how you can compare the two, I don't know how you even mention the 5th largest army in the same breath as some machete swinging African tribes.

[tautomer]

by slownewsday_05 July 8, 2009 If Bush were really in it to prevent genocide instead of to make his oil buddies happy, he would've done something about Darfur.
_____________________________________________________________________________

Obama is too busy with his War for the Oil Pipeline in AfPakistan to worry about Darfur. Keeping Halliburton, Chevron and Exxon fat and rich are Obama's biggest priorities.

[Joe_NY_15]

by gravyboat4000 July 8, 2009 7:51 AM PDT
Joe, the minute we REALLY leave Iraq, it's gonna implode and you know it. Then you'll blame Obama for,"cutting and running".
__________________________

The beginning of the withdrawl was started during Bush, so why would I "blame Obama".....however, he has proved that he hates the Iraqi people, and actually WANTED them to continue to be persecuted under the brutal Hussein regime and to do nothing about the growing threat, voting NO, to removal.....voting YES to continue his brutal vicous genocide of the Iraqi people....he voted in favor of this genocide by his inaction.

[credibility2]

This isn't the first time our so-called secured systems weren't hacked into. If there is credible intelligence that the North Koreans were responsible, even if the compromise was done through third parties, then the U.S. needs to take measures and send a message through a complete destruction of their technical systems. The U.S. should also make sure this doesn't happen again. Presumably we were protected, but this latest revelation proves otherwise. Also, why is the U.S. broadcasting this all over the world? Just what we need, more ammo for our enemies. Obama, the supposed technology president is asleep at the wheel and whomever he's appointed to oversee our technical systems is as unqualified as he is.

[thusspokezara]

Dear Supreme Leader of North Korea. Congratulations on the success of the cyber attack. For your next move, consider massing 2 million troops on the DMZ. If Obama blinks (which he very well might) then overrun the rest of the Peninsula. If he does not blink at least you will have gotten the DOW to drop another 2,000 points.

[smileafter4]

Protect your border, good U.S. intelligence but no more foreign intervention...

[smileafter4]

No matter how many years of "so called" political, social, economic, and foreign policy advancements--the U.S. may believe has accomplished will not change the resentment of many countries such as, North Korea. The U.S. itself should change it's way's by stop intervening in other countries affairs.

[zonkzilla]

Once again our President has proved he is a great leader.
President Obama saw this might happen and had just appointed a person to head a new agency to protect the computers of our government as President Obama saw cyber attacks as a major threat to our security.
Note this was not done until Obama was President.
Thank you Mr. President, keep up the good work.

[Kintari]

Kim Jong Il is dying he wants to go out with a bang.

[sean58z]

This is a simple 9/11 inspired trick.

[johninpennsyl]

How come its not Al Queda this time?
Doesn't Osama Bin Laden have an inter-web machine in his cave?

[Newster1]

N. Korea Suspected of Global Cyber Attack"

Maybe they should get their facts straight and get proof before declaring such inflamatory speculation in the media!
Could be nothing more than another moron teen with too much time on his hands, and N Korea would not more be responsible for that than the USA is for a Kansas teen who breaks into the Russian's compter system.

[starleo146]

here goes the media again telling a story to us and do not have all the facts,you wonder why people are so skeptical,next week we will find it was all a hoax or some smart hacker from India caused the whole thing, has anyone wondered why better security is not in place with our highly confidential computers. We do not need help from the media to bring us down there are enough to go around for everyone.

[johnfranks1234]

In the realm of risk, unmanaged possibilities become probabilities: These data breaches and thefts are due to a lagging business culture. As CIO, I'm always looking for ways to help my team, business teams, and ad hoc measures of various vendors, contractors and internal team members. A book that is required reading is "I.T. WARS: Managing the Business-Technology Weave in the New Millennium."
We keep a few copies kicking around - it would be a bit much to expect outside agencies to purchase it on our say-so. But, particularly when entertaining bids for projects and in the face of challenging change, we ask potential solutions partners to review relevant parts of the book, and it ensures that these agencies understand our values and practices.
The author, David Scott, has an interview here that is a great exposure: http://businessforum.com/DScott_02.html
The book came to us as a tip from one of our interns who attended a course at University of Wisconsin, where the book is in use as an MBA text. It has helped us to understand that, while various systems of security are important, no system can overcome laxity, ignorance, or deliberate intent to harm. The real crux of the matter is education and training to the organization as a whole - and a recurring schedule of training - in building a sustained culture and awareness; an efficient prism through which every activity is viewed from a security perspective prior to action.
I like to pass along things that work, in the hope that good ideas continue to make their way to me.

[dwilson59]

can someone help me use my Iphone some 7 year old can help