China Strengthens its Cyber Warfare Capabilities - How Big is this Threat to the US?

Recently a Chinese military reorganization is increasing the danger posed by People’s Liberation Army cyber warfare and intelligence units that recently were consolidated into a new Strategic Support Force. The announcement of the military reorganization made on Dec. 31 by the Chinese government provided few details of what has changed for three military intelligence units formerly under the now-defunct General Staff Department. U.S. officials and China analysts say the major cyber warfare and intelligence-gathering groups were elevated into the new Strategic Support Force, a military service-level force equal in standing to China’s army, navy, air force and missile services. They include the 3rd Department, or 3PLA, that is believed to have as many as 100,000 cyber warfare hackers and signals intelligence troops under its control. The group includes highly-trained personnel who specialize in network attacks, information technology, code-breaking, and foreign languages. Five members of a 3PLA hacking group were indicted by the Justice Department for commercial cyber attacks against American companies in 2014. The 4th Department, China’s separate military electronic intelligence and electronic warfare service, is also part of the new support force. Additionally, the traditional military spy service devoted to human spying known as 2PLA was combined into the new support force.  More than 500 of the cyber attacks were gauged to involve “significant intrusions” of defense networks. What additional threats do these actions pose to US cyber security? Share your comments with the Cloud and Cyber Security Center: http://cloudandcybersecurity.blogspot.com/