The computer network of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) has been breached by hackers believed to be from China.

The attack was not immediately disclosed by NOAA, the federal agency that supervises the National Weather Service (NWS) along with other programs collecting climate-related data.
Agency runs maintenance procedure, keeps mum about the attack

Security incidents have to be reported at most two days after their occurrence, as per the agency’s policy.

Confirmation of the incident came on Wednesday in a statement from NOAA spokesman Scott Smullen, who said that four websites had been compromised.

An attack on NOAA systems is extremely serious, as the agency operates a network of satellites that provide information about the weather, which is passed not only to the general public but also to airline companies and civilian and military forecasters.

As a result of the attack, the agency ran an unscheduled maintenance on the network in October, but did not provide details about the cause of the action.

Breach details are scanty, Chinese hackers suspected

It appears that the breach occurred in late September, and according to Republican congressman Frank Wolf, the intruders are from China; he received the information from NOAA, as reported by Washington Post.

However, the agency did not share its suspicions on the origin of the attackers, nor did it say anything about the damage caused by the breach, such as planting malicious software or accessing confidential data.

In the case of individual cyber-attacks, it is difficult to determine who is behind them because most of the times hackers hide behind multiple connections, which allows them to carry out the activity from anywhere in the world.

Smullen said that all services are now fully restored and that the incident did not impede the delivery of weather forecasts to the public.

The weather information provided by NOAA is essential and can issue warnings for taking the necessary measures to protect against natural disasters like hurricanes and thunderstorms.

Summer report reveals critical security flaws

In a security assessment report from the Department of Commerce, released at the end of July, it was revealed that NOAA computer systems and practices were beneath the basic protection standards.

It was found that segregation of the computers belonging to different projects was not present, allowing free circulation of information between them.

Furthermore, policies regulating the use of potential malware carriers, such as mobile phones, were not enforced.

On some systems, the autorun feature in Windows was turned on, presenting the risk of threats being automatically executed from connected USB removable drives.

In order to keep up with the defense trends, NOAA has a mandatory IT Security Awareness Training program that must be completed annually by users of its systems (employees, contractors and temporary personnel). This year, all employees were required to complete the course by September 23.