10,000 Indian government and military emails hacked

[Erica Absetz <eabsetz () opensecurityfoundation org>]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/12/21/indian_government_email_hacked/

India’s government and military have suffered one of the worst cyber
attacks in the nation’s history, after over 10,000 email accounts
belonging to top officials were compromised, despite a warning from
the country’s cyber security agency.

The attack came on 12 July, four days after the government was warned
by the National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre
(NCIIPC), part of the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO),
that some sophisticated malware was spotted targeting specific
individuals and organisations.

News of the attack was revealed at a day-long NCIIPC meeting in New
Delhi this week, according to the Indian Express.

Email addresses belonging to officials working at the Prime Minister’s
Office, defence, home, finance and external affairs ministries and
intelligence agencies were nabbed in the attack, which has been blamed
on state actors.

“The Ministry of External Affairs and Ministry of Home Affairs took
the biggest hit, plus strategic information related to critical
sectors, including troop deployment, was compromised,” an NTRO
official told the Express.

“Paramilitary forces were also badly hit, especially the Indo Tibetan
Border Police (ITBP), as deployments were revealed. There were serious
cases of negligence, the involvement of insiders, if any, is also
being checked.”

India’s most prolific foe in cyber space is thought to be Pakistan,
but the frequent skirmishes between the two tend to involve web site
defacements and the occasional DDoS attack from various hacktivist
groups.

Back in March, minister for communications and IT, Sachin Pilot,
revealed that over 100 government sites had been compromised in this
manner between December 2011 and February 2012, while the India CERT
said there were 834 defacements of .in sites in January alone.

However, the attack in July appears to have been more co-ordinated and
carried out with the aim of obtaining specific information.

The NTRO was tight-lipped on the source of the attack.

“We would not like to name the state actors but D4 — destroy, disrupt,
deny and degrade — process was initiated and counter offensive
launched,” the NTRO official told the Express.

Back in June reports emerged that India’s National Security Council
was finalising plans to give the NTRO and Defence Intelligence Agency
(DIA) the power to carry out unspecified offensive operations if
necessary. ®
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