Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub • Hacker News Board

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#31

Post by ptaipale » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:16 AM UTC

Ashwinning wrote: post #16

"blocking GitHub is not really a viable option" he said. Tell that to the world's craziest democracy - India, which banned GitHub, Vimeo, Pastebin and a bunch of others in December last year. Some bans were lifted later. Source : http://www.zdnet.com/article/india-blocks-32-websites-includ...

I think that action was somewhat different in nature, though. It's an instance of Vogon-type bureaucracy that sends blocking orders to Internet service providers without an understanding of the issues. I presume the Indian government is not actively trying to shut down VPNs that people use to access this kind of resources.

In short, I believe the Chinese government knows what it is doing, while the Indian government does not.

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#32

Post by tedunangst » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:26 AM UTC

whoopdedo wrote: post #11

To say that the "Chinese government" is involved I think understates the situation. We know as fact that their army has invested considerable time and money in a cyberwarfare unit. And that the company that operates the Firewall is a military contractor. When Sony was hacked a few months ago, the media couldn't wait to label it a "terrorist act" by North Korea. I just now searched Google News for "github terrorism".…

Not terrorism. The attack was somewhat narrowly targeted (at least as narrowly as technically possible, given it's all on one domain) and also tried to achieve the desired end goal. They weren't blowing up random parts of github infrastructure.

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#33

Post by simula67 » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:29 AM UTC

China is the second most powerful country in the world. Do people really think they are that stupid ? They are not going to attack an American company using infrastructure that anyone can track back to them. This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government. Has anyone considered that angle ?

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#34

Post by prawn » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:38 AM UTC

simula67 wrote: post #33

China is the second most powerful country in the world. Do people really think they are that stupid ? They are not going to attack an American company using infrastructure that anyone can track back to them. This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government. Has anyone considered that angle ?

What's going to happen if they are known to be the attackers but can issue denials? No one is going to pull them up on it.

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#35

Post by stefantalpalaru » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:39 AM UTC

simula67 wrote: post #33

China is the second most powerful country in the world. Do people really think they are that stupid ? They are not going to attack an American company using infrastructure that anyone can track back to them. This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government. Has anyone considered that angle ?

Take a look at this brand new executive order authorizing economical and financial sanctions against global "cyber threats": https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2015/04/01/our-latest-tool-c...

This GitHub business looks more and more like a false flag operation.

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#36

Post by flipp3r » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:40 AM UTC

methou wrote: post #26

nickodell wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The method used to inject these packets on the wire makes this sort of analysis even harder to do this sort of analysis I was under the impression that this was a man on the side attack, so they'd sent a bogus SYN-ACK back to you the moment that they saw a SYN. Theoretically, you should still only be dealing with one RTT. >(and if there was concern, appropriate amounts of random delay and noise could be added). I do…

> I don't think China cares if it gets traced back to them. No they don't, and when time arrives, they deny whatever the accusation is, and claims it's a defamation.

They already did this a couple days ago when someone asked them about it http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/xwfw_665399/s2510_665401/251...

"On your second question, it is quite odd that every time a website in the US or any other country is under attack, there will be speculation that Chinese hackers are behind it."

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#37

Post by kiliankoe » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:40 AM UTC

dexcs wrote: post #13

Is there a statement from github what they think who did the ddos?

No and there probably won't be. Them publicly saying they were being attacked by the Chinese government would put them on some seriously questionable legal ground. They definitely went the right route by not saying anything.

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#38

Post by 1stop » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:42 AM UTC

methou wrote: post #25

whoopdedo wrote: post #11

To say that the "Chinese government" is involved I think understates the situation. We know as fact that their army has invested considerable time and money in a cyberwarfare unit. And that the company that operates the Firewall is a military contractor. When Sony was hacked a few months ago, the media couldn't wait to label it a "terrorist act" by North Korea. I just now searched Google News for "github terrorism".…

> It seems to me that we have officially entered the era of a weaponized internet. Couldn't agree more. And GFW is indeed a WMD that must be stopped.

... I can't tell if this is sarcasm or serious. But seriously... What "Mass destruction" can the GFW cause? ... Like Amazon/Azure/Rackspace are WMDs under your current definition?

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#39

Post by nmc » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:46 AM UTC

simula67 wrote: post #33

China is the second most powerful country in the world. Do people really think they are that stupid ? They are not going to attack an American company using infrastructure that anyone can track back to them. This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government. Has anyone considered that angle ?

Maybe they do not care that "anyone can track [the infrastructure] back to them".

Re: Pin-pointing China's attack against GitHub

#40

Post by jacquesm » Thu, Apr 02, 2015, 10:49 AM UTC

simula67 wrote: post #33

China is the second most powerful country in the world. Do people really think they are that stupid ? They are not going to attack an American company using infrastructure that anyone can track back to them. This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government. Has anyone considered that angle ?

> Do people really think they are that stupid ?

That's not really a defence. They could easily be that stupid, bureaucracies tend to do extremely stupid stuff when looked at from the outside but every cog on the inside thinks that its action makes perfect sense.

> This Github DDoS has got to be the work of someone trying to frame the Chinese government.

Evidence?

> Has anyone considered that angle ?

Sure, but so far the evidence is that that is not the case.

If it is someone trying to frame the Chinese government I'm sure they'll tell us all about it soon.