Security News > 2021 > March > Latest Mass Hacks Highlight Challenge for Biden Administration
The potentially devastating hack of Microsoft email servers, the second major cyberattack in months, adds pressure to the Biden administration as it weighs options for "Hacking back" or other moves to protect cyberspace.
The latest hack exploiting flaws in Microsoft Exchange service is believed to have affected at least 30,000 US organizations including local governments and was attributed to an "Unusually aggressive" Chinese cyberespionage campaign.
The news comes on the heels of revelations that Russia was probably behind the massive SolarWinds hack that shook the government and corporate security last year.
"These are two very big incidents and represent a significant litmus test for the early stages of the Biden administration," said Frank Cilluffo, a former homeland security adviser in the George W. Bush administration who is now the director of Auburn University's McCrary Institute for Cyber and Critical Infrastructure Security.
R. David Edelman, a former digital security adviser to the Obama administration who is now on the faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said the new administration faces difficult choices.
Microsoft said a state-sponsored hacking group operating out of China is exploiting previously unknown security flaws in its Exchange email services to steal data from business users.