GhostNet Chinese cyber espionage

Observer reporting:

After 10 months of study, the researchers concluded that GhostNet had invaded 1,295 computers in 103 countries, but it appeared to be most focused on countries in south Asia and south-east Asia, as well as the Dalai Lama's offices in India, Brussels, London and New York. The network continues to infiltrate dozens of new computers each week.

Such a pattern, and the fact that the network seemed to be controlled from computers inside China, could suggest that GhostNet was set up or linked to Chinese government espionage agencies. However, the researchers were clear that they had not been able to identify who was behind the network, and said it could be run by private citizens in China or a different country altogether. A Chinese government spokesmen has denied any official involvement.

The obvious way for the Chinese to use GhostNet is for commercial purposes rather than diplomatic. Have they been visiting the US Treasury and the Fed and GM etc? The implications of a state with a policy of misusing the internet (I'm assuming agents could not physically get to the computers of the Dalai Lama) is alarming because of the potential breadth of their activities:

GhostNet can invade a computer over the internet and penetrate and steal secret files. It can also turn on the cameras and microphones of an infected computer, effectively creating a bug that can monitor what is going inside the room where the computer is. Anyone could be watched and listened to.

The researchers said they had been tipped off to the network after having been asked by officials with the Dalai Lama to examine their computers. The officials had been worried that their computers were being infected and monitored by outsiders. The Chinese government regularly attacks the Tibetan exile movement as encouraging separatism and terrorism within China. The researchers found that the computers had succumbed to cyber-attack and that numerous files, including letters and emails, had been stolen. The intruders had also gained control of the electronic mail server of the Dalai Lama's computers.

It may turn out that this is the tip of the iceberg with China, but we would be naive to think every modern state of any size is doing anything less. The US has their own monitoring base, USAAISC at Fort Huachuca, Arizona - of which I have previously posted (paranoid alert - it was only Psycho Milt visiting via a US Army ISP in Kuwait!?) in 2006. These stations will be passively collecting publicly available data on the internet like normal aggregating or search and caching systems such as Google and have hacking teams and malware to go in when the filtering and analysis yields targets. I would not be surprised one jot to find every major power doing the same thing - only when other governments (rather than the Dalai Yoda) and corporates find out they are being hacked they do not send out a press release about it because of the damage in credibility they would suffer. You have to wonder how much hacking is kept under wraps.