USA has long accused China of aggressive espionage & reverse engineering.
Officials and organizations have traced various attacks on corporates and government computer
systems in US to computers in China.
The attacks in some cases are so sophisticated that it will be impossible to perpetrate without
the backing of Chinese government.
China has denied these accusations but experts believe otherwise.
From being long way behind the USA in military hardware, China has gained lots of grounds
in last decade.
It has been able to steal sensitive data of many US weapons and have brazenly produced
copies of those weapons by reverse engineering.
The astonishing similarities leave little doubt about Chinese activities of Cyber espionage
and reverse engineering.
The copied weapons will no only poses challenge to US in an event of conflict but also eat
into revenue from exports.
In this video, Defense Updates looks at 5 weapons of US that China has stolen design
information, reversed engineered & created copies.
Note that, these weapons have been listed according to their importance in battlefield.
Lets get started.
In the 1980s, China purchased two dozen civilian version of the Black Hawk (S-70C-2s).
They got some insights about design but were not able to do much since these did not contain
secret components like the military version.
This changed in 2011.
Pakistan gave China access to the previously unknown U.S. "stealth" Sikorsky UH 60 helicopter
that crashed during the commando raid which killed Osama bin Laden in May.
This was done despite, explicit requests from the CIA not to.
It is believed that Chinese experts took detailed photographs of the design and more importantly
collected the sample of the stealth coating, which is used to hide the craft from radars.
In late 2013, China conducted a flight test of a Z-10 helicopter, which closely resembles
the Sikorsky UH-60 “Black Hawk.”
Z-20, improved version of Z 10 is currently in development phase, and is also expected
to enter production in 2018.
For 30 years, AM General's Humvee has served US troops around the world, achieving
iconic status.
In the late 1980s, AM General, a major vehicle manufacturer based in Indiana, wanted to sell
the High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, also known as the Humvee, to the
Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
The PLA rejected the offer, and picked up one Humvee that was left by AM General
in China.
They also gathered the few civilian Humvees that Chinese oil companies had bought in the 1990s.
Using reverse engineering, they built a prototype and named it Dongfeng EQ2050.
Beginning in the winter of 2009, two Chinese hackers began sending malicious e-mails to
Boeing employees disguised to look as if they came from familiar people.
Even if one employee opened the mail and downloaded the attached file, it could give hackers a
portal to secrets, corporate and US Department of Defense plans, engineering details, and
potentially classified Pentagon files stored on Boeing networks.
And that’s exactly what happened.
Over the next two years, hackers stole some 630,000 files from Boeing related to the C-17,
the third most expensive plane that the Pentagon has ever developed, with research and development
costs of $3.4 billion.
They obtained detailed drawings; measurements of the wings and fuselage, and other parts;
outlines of the pipeline and electric wiring systems; and even flight test data.
On 26 Jan 2013 Chinese copy of C17,Y-20 Doppelganger, first flew.
Currently, 8 are in service more production is planned in future.
Beginning in 2011, a series of weaponized emails—PDF and Microsoft Word attachments
with malware inside—were sent to people who work to build American drones.
A cyber security group found that the attachments, many of them with benign titles like "Boeing_Current_Market_Outlook_2011_to_2030.pdf",
originated with a hacker group in Shanghai linked to China's military.
Of the 261 attacks uncovered, 123 targeted U.S. drone companies, from large defense contractors
to small firms.
According to analyst, these were largely successful.
The newest Chinese drones build with stolen data; closely resemble US aircraft visually
and in performance, a remarkable turn-around time for China’s aviation industry.
Second only to the US’s drone fleet in size—Chinese drones could further disrupt the balance of
power in East Asia, and escalate tensions with Japan and other neighbors.
The pentagon began the F 35 program in 2001 with an aim to develop a cost effective replacement
for the U.S military’s F15 fighters, F16 and F18 bombers and reconnaissance aircraft,
and a-10 close air support warplanes.
Apart from United States, the primary customer and financial backer, the United Kingdom,
Italy, the Netherlands, Canada, Turkey, Australia, Norway and Denmark are also part of the program.
F 35 is also being sold to friendly nation like Israel and Japan.
The nine major partner nations, including the U.S., plan to acquire over 3,100 F-35s
through 2035, which, if delivered will make the F-35 one of the most numerous jet fighters.
The fighter aircraft will be in service till 2050 forming the backbone of the air force
for respective nations.
China obtained more than 50 terabytes of data from U.S. defense and government networks,
notably the Joint Strike Fighter’s stealth, radar and engine secrets, through cyber espionage.
The NSA estimated that the Chinese had conducted more than 30,000 cyber attacks as part of
the massive defense industrial espionage, and that more than 500 attacks were significant
intrusions in Department of Defense (DOD) systems.
More than 1,600 network computers were penetrated and at least 600,000 user accounts were compromised,
from the Chinese cyber spying.
In all, the NSA concluded that the Chinese compromised key components of F-35.
Here is list of 2 of them.
1.Northrop Grumman, the jet’s manufacturer, built the AN/APG-81 active, electronically
scanned array radar for the F-35.
The high-tech radar uses small, solid-state transmitter and receiver modules that allow
the jet to avoid detection by enemy radar, a key stealth feature.
2. On F-35 engine schematics, the Chinese stole data on the methods used by the turbine to
cool gases, along with leading and trailing edge engine treatments and engine heat reduction
data—also key elements of its stealth design.
By learning the secrets, the Chinese are able to include the design and technology in Beijing’s
new stealth jets, the J 20 & J 31.
The secret also could allow Chinese air defenses to target the F-35 in a future battle.