US, China Ties Tested in Cyberspace - Wall Street Journal

By JULIAN E. BARNES and SIOBHAN GORMAN in Washington and JEREMY PAGE in Beijing Ties between China and the U.S., strained by military rivalries and maritime disputes, may face an even greater test from the newest front in global conflict: cyberspace. U.S. military and homeland security officials quietly have long blamed the Chinese military for the most egregious assaults on U.S. computer networks. Continued hacking and data theft, however, are being met by an increasing willingness by Washington to publicly point the finger at Beijing. Associated Press Chinese sailors stand at attention on the deck of the nation's first aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, in September. Experts say the subtle but significant shift in how the U.S. approaches the face-off carries significant implications for the next steps of U.S.-Chinese diplomacy as the Obama administration sets about engaging a revamped government in Beijing with its second-term national-security lineup. "There is no doubt that cyber tensions are growing, and they are keeping pace with growing tensions in the near seas of China," said Patrick Cronin, a senior adviser at the Center for a New American Security, a think tank generally supportive of the Obama administration. "In many ways there is a connection between China asserting itself in the maritime domain…and now in the cyber realm as well." Associated Press/U.S. Navy, Chief Mass Communication Specialist Jennifer A. Villalovos U.S. and Japanese ships on a November exercise in the South China Sea. The Obama administration reacted swiftly to a report Tuesday by Mandiant, an Internet security firm, citing evidence that a unit of China's People's Liberation Army was responsible for computer espionage around the world, including cyberattacks on American corporations and government agencies. "The United States has substantial and growing concerns about the threat to U.S. economic and national security posed by cyber-intrusions, including the theft of commercial information," White House press secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday, adding the U.S. has raised its objections "at the highest levels" with China. China disputed Mandiant's allegations and countered with its own statement that the U.S. is the top source of attacks against Chinese targets. "Cyberattacks are anonymous and transnational, and it is hard to trace the origin of attacks, so I don't know how the findings of the report are credible," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said at a daily press briefing that was echoed by officials at the Chinese Embassy in Washington. U.S. officials said the allegations in the Mandiant report come as no surprise and build on other evidence of cyber infiltration. A 2011 intelligence report publicly accused China of a role in cyberattacks. More recently, a U.S. assessment known as a National Intelligence Estimate, which remains classified and hasn't been released, cited the Chinese government as being behind pervasive cyberthefts resulting in the loss of intellectual property, according to people who have read it. The latest revelations come as the U.S. government has scrambled to bolster government and private-sector defenses. President Barack Obama last week signed an executive order to begin to establish voluntary standards for companies to use to improve their cyberdefenses. With a growing body of evidence of Chinese involvement in cybertheft exerting pressure on U.S. relations with China, officials cited one reason for hope: that mounting evidence might force Beijing to engage in a more open and forthright dialogue about its activities, a position echoed by outside defense experts. "Our military already believes the PLA is behind a lot of this stuff," said Martin Libicki, a scholar at the Rand Corp., a nonpartisan think tank that regularly does research for the Defense Department. "The Chinese response is pretty typical: 'How dare you suggest we do this?' But you would think it would be harder and harder for them to maintain that point of view as our evidence gets more and more specific." Some experts say China's leadership change last year, when Xi Jinping succeeded Hu Jintao as president, may present an opportunity for a more frank exchange of views. But Harold Brown, a former U.S. secretary of defense, said the Chinese military sees advantages in secrecy, a view that has consistently derailed attempts to improve defense ties. "In order for there to be a decent military-to-military dialogue, both sides need to say something about what their plans are, how they behave and try to come to agreement on the rules of the road," he said. China broke off military exchanges with the U.S. for a year after the approval of a sale of U.S. arms to Taiwan was announced in January 2010. Diplomats say defense ties improved steadily through 2011 and 2012, with Gen. Liang Guanglie in May becoming the first Chinese defense minister to visit the U.S. in nine years, and U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta paying a reciprocal visit to China in September. In recent months, however, tensions have risen again following a series of confrontations between Chinese and Japanese ships and aircraft patrolling around disputed islands in the East China Sea. While the U.S. has said that it doesn't take a position on the sovereignty of the islands, American officials have made it clear that the islands are covered by the mutual defense treaty between the U.S. and Japan. In Washington, defense and Asia experts argue the growth of revelations regarding Chinese intrusions is elevating cyberattacks to a more serious issue. Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokesman, said Tuesday the U.S. has "regularly and repeatedly" raised concerns with China about cyberthefts with Chinese officials. "We're obviously going to have to keep working on this," she said. China experts in Washington expect the next high-level dialogue to take place when new Secretary of State John Kerry travels to the region in the coming months. President Barack Obama will have the opportunity to meet later this year with President Xi alongside a Group of 20 leading countries in Russia in September. —Aaron Back in Beijing contributed to this article. Write to Julian E. Barnes at julian.barnes@wsj.com, Siobhan Gorman at siobhan.gorman@wsj.com and Jeremy Page at jeremy.page@wsj.com A version of this article appeared February 20, 2013, on page A11 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: U.S., China Ties Tested in Cyberspace. via Technology - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNG27jHmJef9YitXxPgngjTOK1uIDA&url=http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323764804578314591857289004.html

Put the internet to work for you. via Personal Recipe 2598265