11 Apr 11. French Intelligence has managed to uncover a serious hack into an engine subsidiary of French aerospace and defence outfit Safran. According to Le Monde, there was a Chinese link to the hack and investigators have arrested 10 people so far. The hack happened last year and targeted the networks of Safran subsidiary Turbomeca, which makes helicopter engines. The hackers snuffled around and found some interesting stuff about propeller systems at Turbomeca, which they could talk about at Beijing cocktail parties. They also found Safran documents containing information about billing and the cost of various company projects, which is always handy if a company wants to stick in a matching bid. It was not a one off hack. They allegedly took place over the first eight months of 2010. French spooks believe that the hackers might have had help from company insiders. According to the newspaper, French magistrates in Nanterre have been following up on the preliminary information unearthed by the domestic intelligence services (DCRI). Turbomeca happens to be a supplier to China, with one in two helicopters there equipped with one of its engines. It is also business partners with various Chinese companies including the helicopter-making divisions of China’s Aviation Industry Corp, the state-owned aircraft maker. (Source: TechEye)

11 Apr 11. Wi-Fi Security Tools Fluke Networks has announced a new version of the AirCheck Wi-Fi Tester v1.2, a dedicated handheld tool for quickly and easily troubleshooting wireless networks. AirCheck now lets wireless technicians and frontline engineers instantly identify any client device or access point on a wireless network and get detailed information about the device. AirCheck also offers hidden SSID resolution, allowing users to resolve the names of all APs. AirCheck automatically starts discovering networks, access points and channel activity immediately on startup. The tester, which has a five-hour battery life, is suitable for one-handed use and most operations require only one or two key presses. Testing sessions can be saved with the press of a single key, and then downloaded via the USB port to a PC for report generation or archiving with AirCheck Manager software. It costs $1995.00 USD. Free WLAN discovery tools include Net Stumbler and Meraki’s Java Cloud Stumbler. (Source: Len Zuga)

12 Apr 11. Ensuring the security of the cyber domain has emerged as one of the most serious challenges to U.S. national and economic security. Of all U.S. government departments, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has evinced the greatest interest in cybersecurity issues. In a June 2009 speech, Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn warned “the cyberthreat to DoD represents an unprecedented challenge to our national security by virtue of its source, its speed, and its scope.” The Department has launched a number of initiatives to enhance its cyber capabilities. These range from developing new operational concepts, deepening its cyberspace expertise, extending its interagency partnerships, establishing a new U.S. Cyber Command, to trying to change its cybersecurity culture. Starting in 2005, the Director of National Security Agency (NSA) was dual-hatted as commander of the Joint Functional Component Command-Net Warfare. The commander of the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) was also dual-hatted, as commander of the Joint Task Force-Global Network Operations. In 2008, a foreign intelligence agency placed a malicious computer code onto a flash drive that was inserted into a U.S. military laptop, causing the code to spread rapidly throughout U.S. Central Command’s network and transfer classified information to servers under foreign control. In response to this unprecedented disaster, later that year Secretary of Defense Robert Gates placed the Joint Task Force-Global Network Ops under operational control of the commander of the Joint Functional Component Command-Net Warfare. (Source: Len Zu