NSA hacking tools were stolen by China and used to launch cyber attacks

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In a startling revelation made by New York Times(NYT) early today, China is now facing a new allegation of stealing hacking tools from National Security Agency and using them against American allies and private firms operating in Europe and Asia.

Thus, the new allegation put forward by the American media resource clearly suggests that the United States has lost total control on the key parts of its Cybersecurity armory in the past 4 years or so.

Cybersecurity software offering American company Symantec was the resource which leaked the info to NY times and believes that Chinese intelligence did not exactly steal the secrets of its American counterpart. But it captured the secrets when US NSA launched an attack on Chinese military computers in early 2016 under the Barack Obama administration.

It is at this juncture, Chinese intelligence infiltrated into the network of NSA and captured the secrets which the American intelligence agency wasn’t aware till date- according to NYT.

So, here’s where the debate started within the intelligence community on whether or not the Trump led nation should continue in introducing the world’s sophisticated cyber- weapons if it is unable to protect them from the cyberattacks launched by the nation’s adversaries.

According to the New York Times, the United States has so far launched secret cyber attacks on Asian and European Nations. But has no idea on what is going on it its own yard. The popular news resource which has entered the bad books of 45th US President Donald Trump in 2017 claims that Chinese intelligence has already targeted many of the North American digital assets including those operating on space, nuclear, satellite, and technology.

A source from NYT claims that the cyber arm of Chinese military intelligence doesn’t keep all the accessed secrets to itself. But passes them on to other nations like Russia and North Korea who in-turn launch devastating global attacks like for instance, Wannacry ransomware attack.

Note- Shadow Brokers is the source which is said to share the data on the internet which is then purchased by hackers from the dark web.

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Naveen Goud is a writer at Cybersecurity Insiders covering topics such as Mergers & Acquisitions, Startups, Cyber Attacks, Cloud Security and Mobile Security

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