Opinion | How the US shot itself in the foot with indictment against Chinese ‘hackers’
- The details in the indictment against the Chinese nationals were most likely obtained by a US government hacking operation
- China is hardly an outlier in a world where cyberspying and hacking is what modern intelligence agencies in all countries are paid to do
Cyberattacks can be divided into two categories: those conducted by criminals typically for monetary gain and those executed by state agencies and their proxies for national security and economic reasons.
The distinction between the two is consequential. Governments are responsible for cybercrimes emanating from their territory and are obliged to identify, investigate and punish the perpetrators. A state-sponsored cyberattack is a whole different matter.
A hack that is the work of a government would be an act of aggression inconsistent with the United Nations Charter and justifies condemnation and even retaliation.
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US, Britain and EU accuse China of sponsoring massive Microsoft email server hack
Interestingly, in the same week the Microsoft Exchange scandal broke, Microsoft announced that its Windows operating system had been exposed to an attack caused by malware developed by a private company in Israel.
