On April 6th, Threat Post reported that many Chinese VPNS had been attacked by the Dark Hotel APT. (See Story Here.) This shined an interesting light on Cyber Security inside China. It also highlights the recent attacks targeting VPN providers around the world. Security providers are massive targets for cyber criminals and often it isn’t about avoiding the attack as much as mitigating the damages caused by an intrusion. I think many of the security companies suffer intrusions that go unreported because they are able to mitigate the attack and prevent any widespread damage or data loss. In a few cases, this has not been the case with some security and service providers losing complete control of their networks which resulted in large scale ransomware attacks against their customers. (See Here) or (Here). It would be interesting to know if these attacks had a direct negative impact on the service providers. One would think it would, if the provider was identified publicly. So when an attack like this occurs in China, it may often get lost in the noise of every other cyber attack.
However, for many years there have been indications that China was going to a new (old?) model. (See here) They have been closing the Internet and forcing everyone to go through the state-run Internet providers. In some ways, this makes me recall an old software platform called America On-Line. This was often the gateway for non-technical people to access the Internet back in the days of dial-ups and shell access but it also provided an interesting security model. America On-Line controlled the content in their internal marketplace and could also have some control over the users and what they posted. This “new” China model does much of the same thing. The Chinese government has long fought against dissidents and tried to control the Chinese people and what they see and are exposed to on the Internet. There is a long history of software companies having to alter their content in order for the content to be visible inside China. This new “China On-Line” model will further isolate the people of China and allow for more governmental control. Before we all jump on the anti-China bandwagon though, I have to believe other entities around the world are considering this kind of protected enclave for various security models. Russia has tested its ability to shut down the Internet and other countries may also be testing the same ideas. And there is a side benefit: it becomes easier to control the security of the end user when you can control everything the end user sees.
Time will tell how countries go about controlling security and internal conversations but China has taken a definite step in one direction. How effective this will be remains to be seen.