New York Times Hit by Chinese Zombies

My August 1, 2012 story suggesting that the dawning passion of the New York Times for cyber security was still misplaced (read my story here) has just had a postscript. I chided them for buying into the current U.S. mindset that we can play defense only. Hence today's story about their being attacked for the last four months (see their story here) because of an October 25 story exposing the nepotism of China's prme minister Wen Jiabao. Most laughable was the Times assertion:

“Computer security experts found no evidence that sensitive e-mails or files from the reporting of our articles about the Wen family were accessed, downloaded or copied,” said Jill Abramson, executive editor of The Times.

What makes the above laughable is the admission three paragraphs later:

Security experts found evidence that the hackers stole the corporate passwords for every Times employee and used those to gain access to the personal computers of 53 employees, most of them outside The Times’s newsroom. Experts found no evidence that the intruders used the passwords to seek information that was not related to the reporting on the Wen family.

Yeah, right. Much of the story highlights how clever "security experts" and the NYT were in playing defense. The rest of the story outlines other cyberwar exploits. None of the story recognizes the obvious. With due respect, a game plan dedicated 100% to playing defense is flawed on too many levels to enumerate. Too bad "America's newspaper of record" hasn't considered a dialogue about offensive options beyond a bloated federal bureaucracy that can't even secure itself. Too bad we can't publicly debate the merits of unleashing the real creativity and strength of America—licensed and bonded privateers (a la the Revolutionary War) who adhere to the Privateer Code (see www.CyberPrivateer.com)—to put a stop to hackers and bad-cyber-citizen governments and their exploits.

Selah.