French Company Thales Group, a firm that designs and builds electrical systems and provides services for the aerospace, defense, transportation and security markets has issued an alert to the Australian government that all their warships are vulnerable to cyber attacks launched by China and Russia.
The company specified that Anzac Class Frigates manufactured by Thales and the $30 billion Future Frigate Fleet are particularly vulnerable to state-funded attacks.
As France happens to be a NATO ally of Australia and a trade partner in building the $50 billion Future submarines, it has some knowledge on some of the large defense projects taken up by the government of Australia.
Thales is into the supply of critical parts to Australia’s defense vehicles including Hawkei and Bushmaster protected vehicles, minesweepers and software systems. It is said that the multinational company was asked by the Australian government to prepare a report on all the fleets which were vulnerable to cyber attacks.
Furthermore, in 2016 the said company also received a request from the Australian government to work hard to ensure the cybersecurity of all the products particularly those that are being networked into combat management systems be capable to thwart cyber attacks of any range.
This is when the French company found out that most of the water driven military vehicles in Australia were vulnerable to cyber attacks. The company is said to have overhauled the systems with the latest hardware and software in order to isolate them from cyber attacks.
However, as cyber attacks are being driven by sophistication, Thales is ensuring that all the future fleet of vehicles joining Australian defense will have the capability to counter attack the state-funded hackers under usual circumstances.
Note- In August 2017, the American media started to buzz with the news that certain US navy vessels were colliding with commercial vessels in the sea due to an influence from North Korea.
