Adding Insult To Injury: Companies DOJ Says That China Hacked Now Facing Probes Over Failure To Disclose

from the really-winning-fans-here dept

Earlier this week, we wrote about the DOJ filing an indictment against some Chinese hackers who are a part of the People's Liberation Army. We found the situation rather ironic, given all that the NSA has been accused of on the cyberespionage front these days. We also found the whole thing to be incredibly counterproductive as it wouldn't do a damn thing to stop Chinese hacking, but would likely lead to other countries filing criminal charges against NSA hackers.

What was particularly crazy was the DOJ's smug announcement about how it finally had "proof" of Chinese hacks, naming some specific companies which had been hacked. In theory, the DOJ thinks it's helping to protect those businesses, but the reality may be the opposite. It appears that the DOJ may have just created a massive headache for those companies, as they may be facing probes and possible shareholder lawsuits about failures to disclose the hacks to investors. It's not entirely clear they needed to do so -- and the companies insist they revealed all material information -- but from the article, it's clear that class action lawyers will eat this one up and file expensive and wasteful lawsuits.

“The question is would an investor have cared if Chinese hackers broke into a company and were messing around the place?” Jacob Olcott, a principal focusing on cybersecurity at Good Harbor Security Risk Management LLC in Washington, said in a phone interview. “As an investor, show me the evidence that you reviewed this thoroughly.”

So, not only did these companies -- Alcoa and Allegheny Technologies Inc. -- get hacked in a way where it's unlikely that any criminal charges will catch the folks who did the hacking, those same companies may face another legal headache over the failure to reveal they got hacked by the Chinese. So exactly whom is the DOJ helping here?

Filed Under: breaches, china, disclosure, doj, hackers, indictment, privacy, sec
Companies: alcoa, allegheny technologies inc.