The hacking of computers containing climate change-related e-mails may have come from China, in the hopes of scuttling the Copenhagen climate talks, suggests an article from the Daily Mail.
The hack-job that came to be called "Climategate" initially had been attributed to Russia, which in addition to China had little to gain from a successful Copenhagen.
However, the Russian security service released information that allowed the original e-mail traffic to be retraced. According to the article, the e-mails went through a computer company in Siberia, but originated from a computer in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
An open-access server run by Malaysian telecom firm Telekom Malaysia Berhad, which supplies internet access to nearby China, was the source of the e-mail leak.
Because the open server does not require a password, the company said that it could not identify the sender. That has not stopped speculation that China was behind the leaked e-mails.
The IP address used to post the messages is linked to one used by a Chinese environmental institute, the Research Institute of Forest Ecology and Environment Protection, reports the Daily Mail.
Several professors from that institute have shared a platform with the University of East Anglia experts whose e-mails were hacked, according to the Daily Mail.
Many countries and analysts blame China for blocking the adoption of a climate change treaty in Copenhagen in December. The Copenhagen meeting resulted in a non-binding agreement with specifics to be determined in 2010, which angered the poorest nations and some Western groups who wanted an ambitious commitment.
One journalist wrote that China blocked the open negotiations for two weeks and then made sure that the “closed-door deal” made it look like the West failed to help the world’s poor again.
