Security News > 2020 > February > No Surprise: China Blamed for 'Big Data' Hack of Equifax

The takedown of Equifax begs the question of whether attackers might also have been camping out in the networks of other consumer credit reporting agencies - Experian, TransUnion and others - as well as other data brokers.

Interesting overlay: In 2015, President Barack Obama threatened China with severe sanctions if it didn't cease its hack attack ways, and in September of that year, he reached a landmark agreement with Chinese President Xi Jinping, which aimed to put intellectual property off limits for nation-state espionage operators.

"Unfortunately, the Equifax hack fits a disturbing and unacceptable pattern of state-sponsored computer intrusions and thefts by China and its citizens that have targeted personally identifiable information, trade secrets and other confidential information," U.S. Attorney General William Barr said at a Monday press conference.

"The threat from China is real, it's persistent, it's well-orchestrated, it's well-resourced, and it's not going away anytime soon," John Demers, assistant attorney general for national security, said at a Washington conference last week, as ZDNet reported, adding that the FBI has more than 1,000 open cases into the alleged theft of U.S. intellectual property by China.

The massive data broker had allowed eight SSL certificates to expire, leaving it unable to spot data being exfiltrated via encrypted means.

News URL

https://www.inforisktoday.com/blogs/no-surprise-china-blamed-for-big-data-hack-equifax-p-2865