[wplug] US Gov warns of id theft in China

[Michael Semcheski]

On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 5:12 PM, Drew from Zhrodague <drew at zhrodague.net>wrote:

>        As a sysadmin, and tailing logs all day, I see tens of thousands of
> ssh attacks from China (220/8 and 221/8?) and possibly other places
> every day on every host. Is this the chinese government doing this or
> isolated crews? I suspect the latter, but it is still unnerving.
>         Too bad it is against the law to attack back!
>

Another possible explanation for this is that there are a vast number of
compromised systems in China.  Of course, there are vast numbers of
compromised systems in the US, but I think ISP's here are getting proactive
about shutting down the zombie's connection.

That is, the person with whom the attack originates could be anywhere
controlling a distributed network.  The attack may originate from China or
Italy or Russia, but the attacker could be anywhere.

A little off topic, but I think you would definitely have to concede that
cell phones could be remotely monitored.  For example, the cell phone
operator pushes out a patch to the software for the phone.  This patch tells
the phone that when it is turned off, it should turn off the screen and not
ring for new calls.  However, in the "appears to be off state" it should
listen for a control message that tells the phone to turn on the mircophone
and start transmitting.

A little more off topic... If you think the next war will be waged via the
internet, I'd encourage you to read John Keegan's "The Second World War."
Manufacturing capacity and the ability to mobilize industry was the deciding
factor then, my money says that it still is.  First strikes and reducing the
means of communication may help win battles, but wars are won through
attrition.
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