Burglary into the Pentagon

The U.S. Department of Defense has officially acknowledged that there was a serious security incident at the Pentagon nine months ago.

The United States of America also pays very serious attention to the protection of the Pentagon from an IT point of view. However, even for this priority facility, it is true that there is no 100 percent security. This is borne out by the security incident that took place nine months ago, which caused a great deal of confusion for professionals, and the consequences of which still pose risks.

Dennis Clem, chief information officer of the U.S. Department of Defense, admitted at a conference that a successful online attack on the Pentagon system had occurred nine months ago. The expert said the day of the attack was very awful. The intruders gained valuable information about military processes and procedures that they could use at any time.

Investigations revealed that the attack was preceded by a well-prepared activity that lasted about two months. Attackers introduced malicious code into the Pentagon's network and attempted to exploit a known Windows vulnerability. Meanwhile, they had the opportunity to send forged letters that apparently came from Pentagon employees. According to Federal Computer Week, intruders were able to access login information for various systems through these emails. However, network analyzes also showed that the attackers encrypted the data obtained and thus transmitted it to their own servers.

Dennis Clem did not want to reveal details of the attackers' identities, but some speculate that the incident has its roots in China. What is certain is that it took three weeks after the attack for the direct damage to be repaired. All of this cost US taxpayers four million dollars.

Dennis Clem said that the Pentagon is under serious attack every single day. On an average day, approximately 70 intrusion attempts are registered, among which of course there are also "weak" attempts. But as the example shows, more serious problems also arise.

Following the announcement by the specialist, many people received information about the details of the attack in disbelief. For example, problems with Windows vulnerabilities are found to be suspicious. As both military secrets and data have been compromised, the exact details of the security incident are likely to be obscured for a long time to come.