(Insuyori Comprehensive News) Chinese hackers have been accused of carrying out many years and extensive network invasion of government departments and institutions in East African countries to obtain information about Kenya owed Chinese debt.
Reuters on Wednesday (May 24) quoted anonymous people reported that Chinese hackers have launched a three -year network invasion operation on Kenya since the end of 2019.Attacks are mainly targeted at eight government departments in Kenya, including the presidential office, the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Land, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Council Center.
According to the two sources of Reuters and a report written by a defense company, Chinese hackers launch an attack to obtain information about how Kenya plans to manage debt repayment.
A online expert told Reuters that a Kenyan government employee downloaded infected documents at the end of 2019, allowing hackers to penetrate the government network and enter other official institutions.
The expert found that it was a "fish fork -type network fishing" attack from China.The fish fork -type network fishing originated from Asia and Eastern Europe. It is not the sending fishing emails of the Sawang style, but after a wide range of research, the specific object is locked as the attack target.He said that in terms of debt situation, many related documents of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Finance were stolen.
Reuters reports that the time when the attack began is in line with the time when the financial pressure of the Kenyan government began to appear.
The report quoted two sources saying that "the actions of Chinese hackers show that the Chinese government wants to use its spy ability to monitor and protect the country's overseas economic and strategic interests."
Kenya President's Office said that China is not the only country that has been accused of invading the Kenyan government servers. China, the United States, and Europe have frequently tried to infiltrate the servers' servers of the Kenyan government, but "none of them was successful."
A spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in the UK said that these allegations have no basis, Beijing resolutely opposes any form of cyber attacks and theft, and also opposes the use of Internet security and other topics to provoke irresponsible behaviors of China's relations with other developing countries.
China has provided a large loan for Kenya under the "Belt and Road" initiative.Databases at the University of Boston in the United States show that from 2000 to 2020, Kenya owed more than $ 9 billion (S $ 12.23 million) loans from China.Most loans are used in large infrastructure projects, including railway, ports and highway construction.
Bloomberg reported that Kenya planned to negotiate with the Chinese government last October to extend the repayment period of a $ 5 billion loan from 15 to 20 years, because China's loan has suffocated Kenya.
But the Chinese ambassador to Kenya Zhou Pingjian previously said that Chinese creditors accounted for less than 20%of Kenya's foreign debt.
