NZ: Could cyber-attacks target Pacific governments?
Updated
An worldwide attempt to use the internet to get military secrets from Western nations has apparently also affected Australia and New Zealand and while neither Canberra nor Wellington will comment on the identity of the source of the cyber-assaults, sources are pointing at China. If this is happening to developed western nations with well-developed defences against electronic eavesdropping, could smaller Pacific island nations be even more at risk from espionage?
Presenter: Bruce Hill
Speakers: Helen Clark, NZ Prime Minister; Lance Beath, Victoria University of Wellington's Centre for Strategic Studies
HILL: China is certainly making a significant effort to boost its diplomatic and trade presence in the Pacific, but would this also extend to spying? This week's incident in which attempts were made by someone to hack into highly classified government computer networks in Australia and New Zealand is being regarded as a serious cyber attack, almost certainly made by a foreign intelligence agency. No one is coming out and saying who, but New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark says this sort of thing isn't unusual.
CLARK: It's not something unique to us, it's something that every country is experiencing. Now we have very smart people to provide protection every time an attack's tried. Obviously we learn from that.
HILL: I spoke to Lance Beath, a lecturer at the Victoria University of Wellington's Centre for Strategic Studies and asked him that considering that an intelligence agency is apparently capable of attempting something like this in Australia and New Zealand, are smaller and less protected governments in the Pacific even more vulnerable to this sort of cyber attack?
BEATH: I think that's a very fair hypothesis. I would expect that the security systems in place in most Pacific governments would not be up to the standard of Australian and New Zealand and other western governments.
HILL: What kind of targets would be attractive to overseas governments in the Pacific if they were looking for information, what kind of information would they be looking for and how might they go about using computers to get it?
BEATH: Maybe the most plausible line of thinking here Bruce would be the intentions of governments in respect of voting positions in the United Nations or in other international bodies, because of course that's one area where China and Taiwan have been strongly competitive. And so if we are hypothesising that it's the Chinese government and the New Zealand Prime Minister has been extremely careful not to name the government that is responsible, but if it were the Chinese that would indeed point us towards an interest in diving future voting intentions.
HILL: At this stage New Zealand is remaining tightlipped on the source of the hacking attempts aimed at them, but Prime Minister Helen Clark is insisting that whatever information was being sought the attackers didn't get it.
CLARK: What I can stress is that absolutely no classified information has ever been penetrated by these attacks.
HILL: If foreign intelligence agencies were to target Pacific Island governments for information what kind of information would they be trying to get? Lance Beath doesn't believe they'd be looking for diplomatic secrets so much as economic.
BEATH: It's a possible line of argument Bruce I think probably of more interest to both Chinese governments would be the obvious resource riches of the Pacific, and whether that's useful intelligence to pick up in that area I guess might be a little doubtful. But I mean I think that's the focus of Chinese interest, where it's beyond say voter manipulation in the United Nations.
HILL: In New Zealand the big question remains who was behind these cyber attacks? Despite official silence on that issue only one country is being mentioned, China.
CLARK: I'm well aware of who is involved but as minister in charge of security issues I'd never comment on that.
JOURNO: Is it the Chinese?
CLARK: I never comment on who's responsible.
HILL: I asked Lance Beath if he thinks it was the Chinese?
BEATH: Well given the reports that we're seeing of successful Chinese penetration of the Pentagon, the UK Ministry of Defence and reports now of efforts on Australia and New Zealand, yes, I think the answer to your question is fairly self-evident. What we do need to remember or what perhaps the Chinese should remember, if it is indeed the Chinese here is the damage it can do to the atmosphere within which government's consider their interests.
