China seemingly frustrated by the success of India’s vaccine diplomacy and the subsequent disengagement at the Eastern LAC as India foiled China’s nefarious expansion bid, has now resorted to hacking Indian vaccine developers according to a report by cyber intel firm, Cyfirma.
While Chinese propaganda outlet, Global Times continues to claim that India’s vaccine prowess and diplomacy do not affect Beijing, the ground reality is starkly different. According to a report by Cyfirma, at least 15 hacking campaigns are currently active and trying to steal crucial information of patients and Covid vaccine research. India’s Serum Institute, Bharat Biotech, Patanjali and AIIMS are all under the radar of Chinese and Russian hackers.
The report sheds light on how Chinese, Russian and North Korean cyber hackers have unleashed major attack campaigns against International Pharmaceutical companies across the world, with at least four targets in India.
China, who unleashed the pandemic on the world, was hoping to redeem itself and also profit by pushing its vaccines across the world and emerge as a global superpower. However, China’s plans went awry after India developed better and cheaper vaccines with the world queuing up for Made in India vaccines instead of the Chinese vaccines which have questionable efficacy.
Recently, according to a study by Recorded Future, a US-based company, Chinese state backed hackers have targeted Indian organisations in a desperate bid to steal critical information.
The modern day East India Company, the Chinese Communist Party in its quest to colonise the world will stoop to any level to have its way. After India resoundingly defeated China in its own game when it came to vaccine diplomacy or the confrontation at the Eastern LAC, it has now come to light that Chinese state-sponsored groups intruded into the computer networks of at least a dozen Indian state-run organisations to cause major disruptions in the country.
The campaign to intrude into the Indian government run organisations and install malware began in mid 2020 with special focus on power utilities and load despatch centres. The country’s largest power conglomerate, NTPC Limited was among the organisations which was targeted by the Chinese hackers, who also targeted five key regional load despatch centres that help in the management of the national power grid by balancing electricity supply and demand and two ports, according to the report.
The report further states that there was a “steep rise” from the middle of 2020 in the use of a particular software used by Chinese state-sponsored groups to target “a large swathe of India’s power sector”. It added, “In the lead-up to the May 2020 skirmishes, we observed a noticeable increase in the provisioning of PlugX malware C2 infrastructure, much of which was subsequently used in intrusion activity targeting Indian organizations. The PlugX activity included the targeting of multiple Indian government, public sector, and defense organizations from at least May 2020.”
An embattled and cornered China is now waging a digital war against India after its resounding defeat at the border. Unfortunately for Xi Jinping and his minions, nothing can stop India’s rise as the global superpower in the post pandemic era.
