This morning's leading news is the US Justice Department's announcement that it's indicting five members of Unit 61398 (in the 3rd Department of China's People's Liberation Army) on charges of industrial cyber espionage. The indictment alleges theft of trade secrets and other proprietary information from US companies. You may recognize three of the defendants by their handles: Wang Dong (UglyGorrilla), Gu Chunhui (KandyGoo) and Sun Kailiang (Jack Sun).
While it seems unlikely any of those indicted will actually stand trial in Pennsylvania, the charges are a shot across China's bow in an increasingly tense confrontation over cyberspace activities. Coincidentally or not, China recently announced its intention to tighten Internet security in the face of threats from "overseas hostile forces."
Russian cyber operations return to the news as Belgium's foreign ministry continues to untangle itself from what is widely if unofficially regarded as a Russian campaign to support its creeping engulfment of Ukraine. Some observers see the attacks as the opening moves of a campaign against NATO.
In two unrelated campaigns, cyber rioting of unclear motivation and murky ultimate provenance afflicts Turkish and Azeri government sites.
Ransomware continues its rise in popularity among cyber criminals. Sophos offers some pointers on prevention and recovery. Microsoft reports that social engineering more often lies at the root of data breaches than do software bugs.
Plans for retailers' cyber information sharing take shape. Observers wonder whether crowd sourcing will become the future of attack attribution.
The FBI is said to be visiting BlackShades RAT buyers.