China has been blamed for a “massive” hacking attack at Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported Wednesday.
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There was little doubt the source of the attack was China, the broadcaster cited one official as saying.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said: “The Government’s aware of a press report that the Bureau has been the subject of a cyber attack”.
The report can be found here.
The US has previously accused China of hacking American companies to steal industrial trade secrets.
The Bureau of Meteorology said in a statement on its website that it did not comment on security matters, but that it was working closely with security agencies and that its computer systems were fully operational. The Australian weather bureau hosts a high-performance computing center used by multiple government agencies and has network connections to Australia’s Department of Defence.
The Australian Cyber Security Centre warned earlier this year that attempts to compromise government, business and other networks of national importance were regularly identified.
The motivation for the attack on the weather bureau could be commercial, strategic or both, the ABC reported. “Groundless accusations and speculation are not constructive”, ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a regular briefing.
In November, US cyber crime expert Chris Pogue briefed Australian government agencies on the threat of serious data breaches.
ABC quoted unnamed officials blaming China for the alleged hack.
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It said in an statement that it “continues to provide reliable, on-going access to high quality weather, climate, water and oceans information to its stakeholders”.
