Chinese Hackers Steal Top US Weapons Designs 395
n1ywb writes "Chinese hackers have gained access to the designs of many of the nation's most sensitive advanced weapons systems, according to a report prepared for the Defense Department and government and defense industry officials,The Washington Post reported Tuesday. The compromised weapons designs include, among others, the advanced Patriot missile system, the Navy's Aegis ballistic missile defense systems, the F/A-18 fighter jet, the V-22 Osprey, the Black Hawk helicopter and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter." Also (with some more details and news-report round-up) at SlashBI.
Re:Internet connection (Score:4, Informative)
The question is - was the information really that sensitive, or was it the stuff not sensitive enough to be considered classified?
To get anything more sensitive than FOUO, these "hackers" would have had to physically infiltrate a facility, break NSA Type 1 crypto protocols (in which case the DoD would be shitting their pants), or compromise someone with access to such information.
Re: Internet connection (Score:2, Informative)
I'm a British nobody and I knew that. It was all over the news a couple of months ago. Here we are [bbc.co.uk].
Which demonstrates further that almost all classification is about hiding secrets from ones own citizens.
Re:Internet connection (Score:5, Informative)
It makes sanctions, import tariffs and laws like the Patriot Act II much easier to enable.
How can you possibly equate tariffs w/ Patriot Act N? Last time I checked the federal government clearly has the power to levy tariffs, and in the last 200+ years nobody has come up with a decent argument for how they interfere w/ civil liberties. By contrast Patriot Act N is another step in turning that troublesome Bill of Rights into toilet paper.
Re:All part of our diabolical plan... (Score:4, Informative)
The US spends about 20% GDP on social programs (from here [oecd.org]) - below the OECD member average.