S. Korea says China targeted Global Hawk purchase plans

by Steve Ragan - Mar 8 2011, 10:30

A lawmaker in Seoul says that China hacked South Korean networks in order to access plans the nation had to purchase an unmanned spy plane.

Shin Hak-Yong, a Democratic member of South Korea’s parliament's defense committee, told local reporters that the Chinese hackers accessed systems used by the defense ministry, in order to access plans to purchase an unmanned Global Hawk aircraft.

“…the government has not raised the issue with China yet and is still debating how to handle it," Shin's spokeswoman said, quoting Shin. His comments appeared in Monday's Chosun Ilbo newspaper.

According to the AFP, Seoul set aside 45 billion Won last year for the plane purchase, after the North attacked a South Korean warship last March. In addition, the North launched shelling attacks the following November. Those attacks left four dead and injured several others.

On Saturday, South Korean National Cyber Security Center said they had seen signs of a Denial-of-Service attack targeting the presidential office, the Foreign Ministry, the National Intelligence Service, U.S. Forces Korea, and financial institutions. Logs of the DoS attacks point to Chinese origin points.

AhnLab spokesman Park Kun-woo said the attacks seen on Saturday are similar to ones that have targeted South Korean websites in the past.

In response to the South Korean claims, China issued a flat dismissal.

"South Korea's news is groundless. China has been blamed for a number of Internet hacker attacks by the US, Japan, Australia and some other countries in the past," Wang Mingzhi, a military strategist at the People's Liberation Army Air Force Command College, told China’s Global Times on Monday.

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