Chinese cyber attack targeted 30 US firms

Mumbai: With the US State Department getting ready to officially take on China over the attack on Google and the email accounts of human rights activists,  new information shows that over 30 companies with a presence in the US were targeted in a systematic attack.

Some of the leading companies affected by the attack were Yahoo!, Dow Chemicals, Symantec and aerospace giant Northrop Grumman.

Sources tell NDTV that the organized attack has been traced back to China - reason enough for the US to talk tough.

The attack, dubbed Operation Aurora, was first disclosed by Google when it decided to step censoring Chinese content and threatening to withdraw from China.

While the extent of the damage inflicted is still being calculated, online security expert McAfee, which is helping many of the companies targeted, announced a loophole in Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser was exploited by hackers and used in the attack.

Using the loophole, a software was installed onto the machines of the entities targeted which then allowed hackers to access sensitive information.

The disclosure prompted Microsoft to post following note on its blog: "Microsoft has not seen widespread customer impact, rather only targeted and limited attacks. Our teams are currently working to develop an update and we will take appropriate action to protect customers."

Internet security experts say Operation Aurora has proved that the attack originating in China had managed a new level of complexity of targeting multiple companies in multiple ways, and has prompted a re-think of how even giants like Google protect their data against espionage.