The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is looking to enlist the help of India when it comes to contending with cyber threats from China, according to a recent report.
According to a piece in the Economic Times, NATO hopes to strengthen its ties with the Southeast Asia republic, citing its advanced IT industry and cyber knowledge.
“We better figure out a way to cooperate, particularly since it does matter that you have a neighbor (country) next door, which is pretty much involved in cyber issues, even far away. Because in the cyber world, we are equally close,” said one NATO official who given the organization’s rules, declined to give a name.
While China wasn’t exactly mentioned by officials, it’s implied, given the nation’s proximity to India and its dubious online dealings as of late. The fast-developing nation is believed to have developed extensive offensive cyber capabilities. Chinese military hackers or affiliated groups are believed to be behind a torrent of attacks against high level U.S. officials, political activists and private and public sector organizations. Google famously threatened to pull out of the Chinese market altogether following a 2009 attack on that company’s infrastructure believed to originate from within China. Despite that, the much maligned country also claimed it was the target of 500,000 cyber attacks last year.
NATO’s outreach follows up on a pact signed between the United States and India in late July agreeing to collaborate on cyber security issues and a full exchange of cyber security information.
NATO’s most recent vulnerability came in July after hacktivist collective Anonymous claimed to have breached the group, in turn spilling some of the organization’s confidential documents.
