Mark McGowan promises full investigation into Chinese intelligence hacker claims
The West Australian premier has conceded he was blindsided
by revelations his office has been the target of a cyber attack by
Chinese-based hackers.
Mark McGowan said he was unaware of the extraordinary claims
until he was shown a copy of The New York Times on Friday, which published a
story about new hacking software called Aria-body.
The newspaper said on January 3 this year, an email was sent
from the Indonesian embassy in Australia to a McGowan staffer who was working
on health and ecological issues.
The malware was hidden an an attachment in the email,
enabling hackers to remotely take over the computer.
Aria-body was subsequently traced back to a cyber espionage
operation called Naikon, according to Israeli cybersecurity company Check Point
Software Technologies, which released a report on Thursday about the tool.
McGowan said he had referred the matter to the director
general of the Department of Premier and Cabinet for investigation.
“We’ll get to the bottom of whether it’s true and what’s
happened and if any further steps need to be taken,” he said.
“Obviously cyber security is important.”
The cyber security report said it believed the Indonesian
embassy had been the initial target of Aria-body, which was then used to infect
other computers via email, including one address belonging to an “Australian
state government”.
It led the newspaper to initially claim it was the office of
Prime Minister Scott Morrison that was attacked, before seeking clarification
from the Israeli company that it was in fact the WA government
The Chinese hackers were also “persistently targeting” other
government entities in the Asia Pacific region, the report said, including
Indonesia, Vietnam, Myanmar and Brunee.
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