Did Indian Government Spies Hack US Commission?

Officials in the US are exploring claims that spies working for the Indian government managed to successfully hack into an official commission's emails.

The commission in question - the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission - is responsible for overseeing US/Chinese relations on the security and economic fronts and cyber security is one of the key issues it monitors.

The official investigation follows the discovery, online, of documents that hackers claims are official Indian military intelligence material which reportedly mentions plans to attack the US commission's cyber-infrastructure. "We are aware of these reports and have contacted relevant authorities to investigate the matter", a US-China Economic and Security Review representative explained on 10 January, adding: "We are unable to make further comments at this time."

US Commission Hack

Now, there's a new twist to the tale. In recent hours, a member of the Infosec Island online security community has published a piece describing how he's received data from one of the hackers involved, who goes by the name of ‘YamaTough.'

This data amounts to no less than 68 usernames and passwords, all of them relating to the US commission hack and, apparently, it's only a sample. ‘In the best interest of the federal, state and local municipalities and their constituents, Infosec Island will not publish the compromised account data', Infosec Island's Anthony M Freed explained.

‘We have provided the information to the proper authorities and are fully cooperating with law enforcement.'

Indian Government Spies

Meanwhile, news agency Reuters has also seemingly obtained a dataset originating from the hack carried out by the Indian Government spies and, apparently, with similar content.

The US-China Economic And Security Review Commission was established by US Congress in 2000 and, besides cyber security, also explores other issues with a link to China including trade compliance, weapons programmes and energy policies.

If this email hack is confirmed, it would be the most recent in a string of attacks against US-based organisations, varying in scope from internet search engine Google right up to the Pentagon.

Security Technology will report on this story further as future facts emerge.