Hackers

I was interested to read that five Chinese army officers have been indicted by the Justice Department for penetrating the computer networks of American corporations, presumably stealing technological secrets and whatnot.  Then I thought about the whatnot.

If you can penetrate a company's system, you should be able to gather information that is, potentially, more valuable than a diagram of the next great widget.  You can discover when that widget will be brought to market, and the impact it may have on the price of that company's stock.

If Chinese hackers can do it, I imagine more local hackers can do it as well, opening up a whole new realm of insider trading.  If the Chinese army can do it, so can Global Octopus Investment Bank.  I am guessing that the system is more rigged than ever.