Several nations and groups are trying to break into the US militaryÂ’s computer system, the Pentagon said on Tuesday after reports ChinaÂ’s military had successfully hacked into the network. The Chinese militaryÂ’s cyber-attack was carried out in June following months of efforts, the London-based Financial Times reported on Tuesday, citing unnamed current and former US officials.Officials had told the paper the attack was by ChinaÂ’s PeopleÂ’s Liberation Army (PLA) and that it led to the shutdown of a computer system serving the office of Defence Secretary Robert Gates.
Patrick Ryder, a US Defence Department spokesman, declined to comment on the reported Chinese attack but said the Pentagon “aggressively monitors its networks for intrusions and has appropriate procedures to address” them. “We know that a number of nations and groups are actively developing these capabilities”, he told AFP. “We have seen attempts by a variety of state and non-state sponsored organisations to gain unauthorized access to, or otherwise degrade, DoD (Department of Defence) information systems”, he said without identifying them.