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Cyberattack steals Google passwords

Tuesday, 20 April 2010, 22:21 IST
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Cyberattack steals Google passwords
Bangalore: The key password system of Google that controls access of millions of people worldwide to connect to almost all of the company's Web services, including e-mail and business applications was stolen when the search engine was hacked in an attack,reports Jonathan Stempel from Reuters. The software code-named Gaia for the Greek goddess of the earth, and still in use under the name Single Sign-On, the program was described publicly only once at a technical conference four years ago, As per the New York Times. The intruders do not appear to have stolen passwords of Gmail users, and Google quickly started to strengthen security. But the theft leaves open a possibility, perhaps faint, that the intruders may find weaknesses that Google might not know about, the newspaper said, citing independent computer experts. Google disclosed the hacking on January 12, when on its website it reported having detected "a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China that resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google." The Mountain View-based company said the attack appeared to target Chinese human rights activists, and that only two Gmail accounts appeared to have been accessed. "We're not going to comment beyond our original blog post, that remains our statement of record on the issue," said Jay Nancarrow, a spokesman for Google. When it revealed the attack, Google said it would stop censoring search results on Google.cn. In March, it closed its China-based Web search service and began redirecting users to an uncensored portal in Hong Kong. That decision came amid heightened tensions between China and Washington, D.C.

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