Chinese hackers stole COVID-19 vaccine research from Spanish labs, says report
Chinese hackers have stolen information from Spanish laboratories working on a vaccine for Covid-19, El Pais newspaper reported Friday.
The report emerged as drug companies all over the world race to produce a powerful jab to counter a virus which has now killed more than 940,000 persons and infected 30 million.
It was not yet determined what information was taken, when it just happened, nor how important it had been, with the paper citing sources aware of the attack.
Quoted in this article, Spain’s secret service chief Paz Esteban said hackers had mounted “a particularly virulent campaign targeting laboratories focusing on the visit a vaccine” not merely in Spain but elsewhere.
Talking with journalists on Thursday, Esteban who heads the CNI intelligence services, said there have been a “qualitative and quantitative” upsurge in attacks during lockdown, with hackers targeting “sensitive sectors such as healthcare and pharmaceuticals”.
Such attacks had multiplied far away involved in efforts to build up a vaccine, prompting an exchange of information between their respective spy services, she said.
Most attacks were carried out by code hackers from China and Russia, often from state organisations, but also by criminal organisations and universities who trade in hacked data, security sources said.
But the attack where Spanish data were stolen premiered by Chinese hackers, they said.
The CNI had not been immediately available to comment on the report.
In July, a court in america state of Washington charged two Chinese nationals with stealing terabytes of data from hundreds of computer systems worldwide, in some cases on behalf of Chinese government agencies.
The hacking, which occurred over a decade, had recently involved looking for vulnerabilities in the systems of firms developing Covid-19 vaccines, testing technology, and treatments, the united states justice department said.
Spain was among 11 countries named in the indictment to be targeted by the attacks.
