U.S-China Cyberwar Rumors Overblown?

May 4, 2001 — -- Cyberwar, or electronic food fight?

Well into a much-hyped "cyberwar" rumored for this week between U.S. and Chinese hackers, Internet security experts describe the activity so far more as typical than warlike.

Although the two sides seem to be exchanging taunts and defacing Web sites — including scattered American government-operated sites — the overall level of damage to data on sites appears to be limited, several security experts say.

"It's really, literally, the electronic equivalent of graffiti," says Paul Robertson, director of risk assessment at TruSecure, an Internet security company. "There's nothing big here. It's a bunch of kids who usually [metaphorically] spray paint walls, picking the walls they spray paint and picking the messages they paint."

Among the American government sites defaced recently have been pages operated by the departments of labor, health and energy, said Michael Assante, a security consultant for Vigilinx Inc., another company that provides Internet security.

However, a White House spokesman said an apparent "denial of service" attack hobbled parts of the White House Web site this morning. The spokesman said the attack, in which the site was bombarded with requests for information and overloaded, is being investigated. The origin of the attack has not been determined.

There had been threats about hacking the White House in Chinese chat rooms, Assante said. However, he and Robertson said they had no evidence that such threats were carried out.

Rumors of a planned anti-American cyberwar by Chinese hackers from April 30 through May 7 arose after the federal government's National Infrastructure Protection Center issued an advisory on April 26.

"Chinese hackers have publicly discussed increasing their activity during this period, which coincides with the dates of historic significance to the PRC [People's Republic of China]," the advisory reads. "May 1 is May Day; May 4 is Youth Day; and, May 7 is the anniversary of the accidental bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade" by the United States in 1999.