In recent months, the government of The Netherlands has made an unusual first. First, they have admitted key government IT systems had experienced a prolonged, multi-year cyber breach which may have led to the theft of several state secrets. Second, they publicly accused Chinese state-sponsored hackers for the breach.

Cyberespionage is common

Espionage, stealing state secrets and intelligence, has been standard practice for most countries since the dawn of civilization. But in the age of the internet, the process of stealing information has become easier, and more widespread than ever before.

China is well-known for its cyber army, thousands of highly trained hackers backed by immense levels of funding. This army routinely infiltrates foreign networks to conduct spying missions or disruptive attacks.

What happened in The Netherlands

According to the Dutch government, several remote access trojans (RATs) were discovered lurking within their networks. RATs are used to compromise a target network and to remain in place undetected for months or years. By remotely triggering the RAT, hackers can access the compromised systems at will to steal data or to disrupt operations – usually completely undetected.

The Dutch government is concerned that in this instance, Chinese hackers have been stealing highly sensitive intellectual property from semiconductor manufacturers. This information may contain important trade secrets about computer chip design.

How can I protect myself against computer espionage?

In most cases, home computer users have no reason to worry about falling victim to state-sponsored hacking by the Chinese. Unfortunately, many of the techniques used by cyber armies are exactly the same as those used by regular profit-oriented hackers. So it does make sense to protect yourself.

Most important, is the use of a modern antimalware tool like Panda Dome. As well as scanning for known viruses and ransomware, Panda Dome closely monitors every process and activity that happens on your device. Suspicious activity is blocked automatically as soon as it is detected. This proactive approach ensures you can detect and remove potential viruses even before they are commonly ‘known’.

A good antimalware tool will also provide ‘heuristic scanning’. These tools analyze the code for every application, detecting and blocking potentially malicious payloads before they can be executed.

Adopting a proactive approach to malware scanning and blocking is absolutely vital. In the case of the Dutch government networks, the RATs were not detected because they were ‘unknown’. With heuristic scanning and anti-exploit technology, the suspicious activity enabled by a RAT would be detected – and blocked – before any data is stolen.

To learn more about Panda Dome and how it can protect you against cyber espionage, you can download a free trial today.