By Christina J. Kostopoulou
Lockheed Martin, the US government’s top IT provider revealed that it’s information system has been atttacked by hackers last week. Lockheed Martin is the word’s biggest aerospace company and the Pentagon’s No 1 supplier by sales. Jennifer Whitlow, a spokeswoman for the company, said that they have been working to restore the employee acess to the network and that as a matter of policy they didn’t discuss any specific cyber threats or the measures taken in response. Thanks to instanteneous reactions to the attempted intrusion on May 21st, no serious damage was caused. The company is now working with the US Defense Department to determine the scope of the attack and where it originated.
Network and computer-security issues haven taken on significant importance in recent weeks after a high-profile hack of several Sony Corp. systems that led to a breach of personal information. The breack included names and addresses associated with teh more than 100 million accounts. The Japanese technology giant had to temporarily shut two of its biggest gaming networks, the PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment, hurting its reputation with consumers. The hack was discovered more than a mongh ago, and was sophisticated enough to force Sony to admit that it is not certain yet wheather credit-card information associated with the accounts was accessed or not.
The Sony incident has also raised requests from Congress about the specific information that was breached and how soon Sony notified its customers and law enforcement. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has also been called to assist with the investigation process.
