Sensitive Japanese power plant information has been
leaked onto the internet via an employee-installed share-filing
program, for the second time in four months.
Security information about a plant run by the Chubu Electric
Power Company was spread by the Share file-sharing program,
installed by a 40-year-old employee.
The file-sharing program is said to have distributed documents
to other internet file sharers regarding the plant's security
arrangements, the names and addresses of its security personnel,
and other confidential information.
The company has blamed an unnamed virus on the employee’s
machine for spreading the information.
Only four months ago, the power company suffered a similar
problem when sensitive information was leaked via the Winny
file-sharing program.
At the time the company said it would prohibit the installation
of file-sharing software on employees' computers. It has not been
disclosed whether the latest culprit has been sacked.
Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for security
software company Sophos, said, “There have been a series of viruses
written specifically to leak information from infected PCs onto
Japanese file-sharing networks, causing embarrassing headlines for
the companies concerned.
“Questions will surely be asked as to whether sufficient steps
were taken to curb the problem at Chubu Electric,” he said.
In June 2005, it was reported that nuclear power plant secrets
had been leaked from a computer belonging to an employee of
Mitsubishi Electric Plant Engineering.