ID :IRCNE2011121331
Date: 2011-12-03
A leading cyber-crime expert says foreign hackers who launched a massive attack on Canadian government computers last fall also broke into the data systems of prominent Bay Street law firms and other companies to get insider information on an attempted $38-billion corporate takeover.
"All those different attacks on companies, law firms and government were all interconnected — they weren't isolated incidents," he said in an interview with CBC News.
He says the hacking methods used were so sophisticated the intruders almost completely erased their tracks after the attacks.
While Tobok isn't pointing fingers, he estimates the PotashCorp attack had to have involved more than 100 hackers, leaving little doubt in his mind the whole thing was the work of a foreign intelligence service, or was otherwise "state-sponsored."
hackers penetrated the computer systems of at least seven of Canada's leading law firms in what experts believe was an attempt to mask the real target of the attacks — the few firms directly involved in the aborted Potash deal.
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