January 13, 2010

Google's decision Tuesday to risk walking away from the world's largest Internet market may have come as a shock, but security experts see it as the most public admission of a top IT problem for U.S. companies: ongoing corporate espionage originating from China.

Pt's a problem that the U.S. lawmakers have complained about loudly. In the corporate world, online attacks that appear to come from China have been an ongoing problem for years, but big companies haven't said much about this, eager to remain in the good graces of the world's powerhouse economy.

It seems that with 2010 on the horizon, some organizations are either only now moving to Office 2007 or are still struggling with Office 2007 more than three years after it shipped. Directions on Microsoft managing vice president of research Rob Helm tells The Reg he expects more customers will experience problems as they too make the move to Office 2007. Helm said some organizations are only now upgrading after postponed the move because of the changes involved.

Google, by implying that Beijing had sponsored the attack, has placed itself in the center of an international controversy, exposing what appears to be a state-sponsored corporate espionage campaign that compromised more than 30 technology, financial and media companies, most of them global Fortune 500 enterprises.

The U.S. government is taking the attack seriously. Late Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a statement asking the Chinese government to explain itself, saying that Google's allegations "raise very serious concerns and questions." "The ability to operate with confidence in cyberspace is critical in a modern society and economy," she said.

The search-engine company first learned it had a security problem in mid-December, coincidentally just days after hosting a closed-door symposium on circumventing censorship. Soon the company's security team realized that it was dealing with more than just a few hacked workstations.

"First, this attack was not just on Google. As part of our investigation we have discovered that at least twenty other large companies from a wide range of businesses -- including the Internet, finance, technology, media and chemical sectors -- have been similarly targeted," wrote Google Chief Legal Officer David Drummond in a Tuesday blog posting. "Second, we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists."

Source:-http://www.pcworld.com