WASHINGTON — A ninth U. S. telecommunications company has been proven to have been hacked as part of a vast Chinese espionage crusade that provided Beijing officials with personal text messages and phone conversations from a number unknown to Americans, it said Friday. a senior White House official.
Biden administration officials said this month that at least eight telecommunications companies, as well as dozens of nations, had been affected by the Chinese hacking blitz known as Salt Typhoon.
But Anne Neuberger, deputy national security adviser for cybersecurity and emerging technologies, told reporters Friday that a ninth victim had been identified after management instructed companies on how to track down Chinese culprits on their networks.
Neuberger’s upgrade is the latest progression in a major hacking operation that has alarmed national security officials, exposed cybersecurity vulnerabilities in the sector and laid bare the sophistication of China’s hacking.
The hackers compromised corporate telecommunications networks to download visitor call logs and access the personal communications of a “limited number of people. “Although the FBI has not publicly met any of the victims, high-ranking U. S. government officials and prominent political figures are among those whose communications were accessed.
Neuberger said officials did not yet have a precise sense of how many Americans overall were affected by Salt Typhoon, in part because the Chinese were careful about their techniques, but a “large number” were in the Washington-Virginia area.
The hackers’ purpose was to identify who the phones belonged to and, if they were “targets of government interest,” to spy on their text messages and phone calls, he said.
The FBI said most of the people targeted by hackers are “primarily related to government or political activities. “
Neuberger said the episode highlighted the need for required cybersecurity practices in the telecommunications sector, an issue the Federal Communications Commission will discuss at a town hall next month.
“We know that voluntary cybersecurity practices are not enough to oppose attacks on our critical infrastructure through China, Russia and Iran,” he said.
The Chinese have denied any responsibility for the attack.
Tucker writes for the Associated Press.
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