Police in Hubei Province have shut down a hacker training operation that openly recruited thousands of members online and provided them with cyberattack lessons and malicious software, state media said yesterday.
The crackdown comes amid growing concern that China is a center for Internet crime and industrial espionage. Search giant Google said last month its e-mail accounts were hacked from China in an assault that also hit at least 20 other companies.
Police in Hubei arrested three people suspected of running the hacker site known as the Black Hawk Safety Net that disseminated Web site hacking techniques and Trojan software, the China Daily said.
Trojans, which can allow outside access to a computer when implanted, are used by hackers to control computers remotely. The report did not say exactly when the arrests took place.
Black Hawk Safety Net recruited more than 12,000 paying subscribers and collected more than 7 million yuan (US$1 million) in membership fees, while another 170,000 people had signed up for free membership, the paper said.
The report said police seized nine servers, five computers and a car, and shut down all Web sites involved in the case. Authorities also froze 1.7 million yuan in assets.
The shutdown of the site followed an investigation involving 50 police officers in three other provinces, another newspaper said.
The case can be traced to a hacking attack in 2007 on an Internet cafe in Macheng City in Hubei that caused Web services for dozens to be disrupted for more than 60 hours, the paper said. A few of the suspects caught in April said they were members of the Black Hawk Safety Net.
Black Hawk’s Web site 3800hk.com could not be accessed, but a notice purportedly from Black Hawk circulating on online forums said that a backup site had been set up.
The notice also sought to reassure members of its continued operations and said its reputation was being smeared by some Internet users.
“At this time, there are Internet users with evil intentions who have deliberately destroyed Black Hawk’s reputation, deceived our members and stole material,” the notice addressed to members said. “We must join forces and attack these Web sites.”
The Hubei government refused to comment yesterday.
Nvidia Corp yesterday unveiled its new high-speed interconnect technology, NVLink Fusion, with Taiwanese application-specific IC (ASIC) designers Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and MediaTek Inc (聯發科) among the first to adopt the technology to help build semi-custom artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for hyperscalers. Nvidia has opened its technology to outside users, as hyperscalers and cloud service providers are building their own cost-effective AI chips, or accelerators, used in AI servers by leveraging ASIC firms’ designing capabilities to reduce their dependence on Nvidia. Previously, NVLink technology was only available for Nvidia’s own AI platform. “NVLink Fusion opens Nvidia’s AI platform and rich ecosystem for
WARNING: From Jan. 1 last year to the end of last month, 89 Taiwanese have gone missing or been detained in China, the MAC said, urging people to carefully consider travel to China Lax enforcement had made virtually moot regulations banning civil servants from making unauthorized visits to China, the Control Yuan said yesterday. Several agencies allowed personnel to travel to China after they submitted explanations for the trip written using artificial intelligence or provided no reason at all, the Control Yuan said in a statement, following an investigation headed by Control Yuan member Lin Wen-cheng (林文程). The probe identified 318 civil servants who traveled to China without permission in the past 10 years, but the true number could be close to 1,000, the Control Yuan said. The public employees investigated were not engaged in national
ALL TOGETHER: Only by including Taiwan can the WHA fully exemplify its commitment to ‘One World for Health,’ the representative offices of eight nations in Taiwan said The representative offices in Taiwan of eight nations yesterday issued a joint statement reiterating their support for Taiwan’s meaningful engagement with the WHO and for Taipei’s participation as an observer at the World Health Assembly (WHA). The joint statement came as Taiwan has not received an invitation to this year’s WHA, which started yesterday and runs until Tuesday next week. This year’s meeting of the decisionmaking body of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, would be the ninth consecutive year Taiwan has been excluded. The eight offices, which reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, are the British Office Taipei, the Australian Office Taipei, the
CAUSE AND EFFECT: China’s policies prompted the US to increase its presence in the Indo-Pacific, and Beijing should consider if this outcome is in its best interests, Lai said China has been escalating its military and political pressure on Taiwan for many years, but should reflect on this strategy and think about what is really in its best interest, President William Lai (賴清德) said. Lai made the remark in a YouTube interview with Mindi World News that was broadcast on Saturday, ahead of the first anniversary of his presidential inauguration tomorrow. The US has clearly stated that China is its biggest challenge and threat, with US President Donald Trump and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeatedly saying that the US should increase its forces in the Indo-Pacific region
RSS