What to know about string of US hacks blamed on China

US officials say Chinese state-owned hackers are responsible for security breaches at major US telecommunications companies and corporations.

The latest robbery, announced on Monday, It was directed at the US Department of the Treasury, which called the entry a “major event”.

Officials said the hackers were able to access the employee’s workplace and other unknown documents. China refuses to participate.

It is the latest in a series of attacks in recent months against the US and other Western countries.

The Treasury Department hack follows news in late October that two major US presidential campaigns are being targeted.

The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (Cisa) said the hack targeting the White House campaign was carried out “by actors affiliated with the People’s Republic of China”.

In September, reports surfaced about an operation that managed to breach security at a top telecommunications company.

The White House said at least nine companies were hacked, including telecom giants AT&T and Verizon.

And at the beginning of the year, in March, Seven Chinese nationals were charged with smuggling which spanned at least 14 years and highlighted China’s foreign critics, businesses and politicians.

Projects linked by Western governments to China have also affected the UK’s Electoral Commission, as well as the UK and New Zealand parliaments.

Although details have yet to be revealed, the hacks appear to be the work of several different groups — each, US officials say, linked to China.

Theft groups are assigned names by security companies. For example, the group that manages telecoms is best known as Salt Typhoon, a name given to it by Microsoft researchers. Other companies called it Famous Sparrow, Ghost Emperor and Earth Estrie.

A salt storm is believed to have disrupted telecoms. Another group, called Volt Typhoon, accused of entering into organizations necessary for disruption.

Seven Chinese nationals accused of fraud were linked by US Justice Department officials to an operation known as Zirconium or Judgment Panda.

The UK’s National Cyber​​​​Security Center said the same service looked into the emails of UK MPs in 2021.

The most recent hacks appear to have been aimed at powerful individuals and gathering information to benefit the Chinese government.

Among others, they looked into the phones of President-elect Donald Trump, Vice President-elect JD Vance, and people working on the campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris.

The hackers also accessed a database of law enforcement phone numbers — information that experts say could be used to determine which foreign spies are being monitored.

And millions of Americans may have had their data breached by attacks on telecom companies.

Richard Forno, assistant director of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County Cybersecurity Institute, said China’s efforts are being directed at different goals.

“I’m gathering a lot of information, let’s see what we can get into, and see what we can find,” he said.

US lawmakers from both parties have said they have been affected by the hacks.

Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat, called the Salt Typhoon incident “the worst telecommunications disaster in our nation’s history”.

Brendan Carr, Trump’s nominee to chair the Federal Communications Commission, said the briefing about the hacking was “very concerning”.

“The information I heard, it made me want to smash my phone at the end of it,” he told CNBC.

FBI Director Christopher Wray recently said that the Salt Typhoon hacking of the telecommunications industry was “the most important cyber-espionage campaign in Chinese history”.

He previously said that China’s hacking program was “more than [that of] all other major countries together. “

In addition to the charges brought against seven Chinese citizens, earlier this month US officials warned China Telecom Americas, the US subsidiary of one of China’s largest telecommunications companies, that it was a national security threat.

The company has 30 days to respond, and may eventually be banned.

In May, a The UK has approved two people with Wuhan Xiaoruizhi Science and Technology Company Ltdwhich it said was linked to Chiweruzo Panda.

Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz has said that foreign hackers should face “higher costs and consequences”.

Forno, of the UMBC Cybersecurity Institute, said the hacks may have been years in the making.

“China has traditionally been very slow and discreet in its espionage and intelligence operations,” he said. “The US tends to be more expansive and more interested in immediate and visible results.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning told reporters that the accusations were “baseless” and “baseless”.

“China has always opposed all forms of deception and strongly opposes the spread of false information that targets China in the political sphere,” Mao said.

A spokesman for the Chinese embassy said in a statement: “The US should stop using cybersecurity to humiliate and humiliate China, and stop spreading all kinds of lies about China’s threats.”