China's Cyberspace Administration and Cyber Security Law

TLP AMBER ANNOUNCEMENT:
 

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) was formed in 2014 as the principal Chinese government entity responsible for Chinese Internet content control. The current CAC Director, Xu Lin, is a close political ally to Chinese President Xi Jinping. The CAC likely directly reports to a committee chaired by President Xi and all official actions indicate that the regime is very serious about exerting significant control over the Chinese Internet. Most CAC enforcement activity has focused on Internet political control, in which "cyber security" involves censorship of any dissent. There is no indication that the CAC is enforcing controls over foreign corporations on data flow out of China, hardware requirements for acquisition and use inside China, or security inspections of foreign companies. As the designated agency to implement and enforce the cyber security law, the CAC has become the central entity in the Chinese Internet monitoring and censorship regime...READ MORE

Wapack Labs has cataloged and reported on Chinese Internet control in the past. An archive of related reporting can be found in the Red Sky Alliance portal.

WWW.WAPACKLABS.COM

 
This TLP AMBER report is available only to Red Sky Alliance members.

Russian ISP Doing Business with North Korea

On 01 Oct 2017, TransTeleCom, a Russian owned telecommunications company began routing North Korean Internet. TransTeleCom owns one of the largest fiber optic cable based networks in the world. It is a fully owned subsidiary of Russian Railways, a joint-stock company with 100 percent involvement under the Russian Ministry of Transport. North Korea’s external Internet connections were historically serviced by China Unicom, but will now be provided by both China Unicom and Russia’s TransTeleCom. IPv4 traffic route allocation is 60 percent through TransTeleCom and 40 percent through China Unicom. Unicom will continue providing 100 percent IPv6 routing for North Korea. The contract between TransTeleCom and North Korea was originally signed in 2009. The recent Russian telecommunications escalation seems to be in support of North Korea after U.S. Cyber Command Distributed-Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks. Having routes in both China and Russia limits North Korea’s dependence on any one country as they are currently facing intense geopolitical pressures. North Korea’s shift from being predominantly Chinese hosted, to Russian support, is primarily due to U.S. political pressure on China to sever ties with North Korea over the recent nuclear missile tests and China’s failure to protect North Korea from the recent U.S. DDoS attacks. TransTeleCom operates similarly to China Unicom, the current North Korean Internet Service Provider (ISP), which has fiber optics laid along China’s Sino-Korean Friendship Bridge. However, TransTelecom is believed to be delivering North Korea’s Internet over the Korea-Russia Friendship Bridge, the only crossable border between North Korea and Russia. Wapack Labs will continue to monitor malicious cyber activities out of North Korean netblocks....READ MORE

Wapack Labs has cataloged and reported on North Korean cyber activity in the past. An archive of related reporting can be found in the Red Sky Alliance portal.

WWW.WAPACKLABS.COM

The Gambia Internet Embargo

On 30 November 2016, ahead of presidential elections the following day, The Gambian government blocked all Internet services as well as incoming and outgoing international phone calls.  On 2 December 2016 President Yahya Jammeh reversed his decision to accept the election results that made Adama Barrow President, and declared new elections would be held due to “serious and unacceptable abnormalities.” A highly credible Wapack Lab source stated urging from foreign leaders prompted the swearing in of Barrow at The Gambian Embassy in neighboring Senegal. On 21 January 2017 Jammeh agreed to step down and leave the country; social media users reported messaging apps on at least one of the top 3 service providers in the country were unblocked. 

Wapack Labs has reported on The Gambia in the past. An archive of related reporting can be found in the Red Sky Alliance portal in the Red Sky Alliance Portal.

TLP: GREEN
ACTOR TYPE: (N/A) 
SERIAL: TR-015-2017 
COUNTRIES: GM 
REPORT DATE: 20170125