Chinese hackers are gaining access to US telecommunications companies, worrying national security officials

CNN
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Over the past few months, a highly skilled group of hackers linked to the Chinese government has infiltrated multiple U.S. telecommunications companies in an apparent search for sensitive information affecting national security, multiple sources briefed on the matter told CNN.

U.S. investigators believe hackers potentially accessed wiretapping warrant applications, two sources said, but officials are still working to determine what information the hackers may have obtained. Sources say the targets include U.S. broadband and internet service providers AT&T, Verizon and Lumen.

U.S. officials are concerned about the potential harm to national security from the hack, which they only recently discovered. This is the latest, sophisticated product hack attacks U.S. federal agencies that investigators have linked to China and comes amid tensions between Washington and Beijing over cyberespionage and other significant national security issues.

American telecommunications companies, the backbone of Internet and telephone communications, store vast amounts of caller and user data. U.S. law enforcement agencies request access, on a warrant, to certain portions of this data as part of criminal and national security investigations.

Some of these investigations would be of great interest to Beijing. In recent years, the U.S. government has brought charges against Chinese government agents for allegedly harassing Chinese citizens on U.S. soil and for hacking political dissidents and U.S. companies.

AT&T and Lumen declined to comment. Verizon did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The Department of Justice and the FBI declined to comment on the case.

China’s embassy in Washington has denied that Beijing-backed hackers breached U.S. telecommunications companies, calling the report a “distortion of facts.” Embassy spokesman Liu Pengyu accused the United States of “politicizing cybersecurity issues to malign China.”

The Wall Street Journal was the first to report the hacker attacks.

U.S. officials briefed the House and Senate intelligence committees on China’s hacking campaign, according to two sources. Cybersecurity experts from Microsoft and Google’s Mandiant are helping investigate hacking activity.

Sources briefed on the matter say those investigating the hacking attacks were impressed by the hackers’ skill, persistence and ability to break into computer networks. The Chinese hacking team is known in the cybersecurity industry as Salt Typhoon.

However, according to US officials and private experts, the Chinese government has a number of other hacking teams at its disposal that can conduct espionage or disrupt computer networks. FBI Director Christopher Wray said that Chinese government-backed hackers outnumber FBI cyber personnel 50 to 1.

Another hacking group backed by the Chinese government is lurking in U.S. transportation and communications networks, waiting for that access to be used to disrupt any U.S. response to a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, U.S. officials say.

CNN reported that another Chinese group hacked the unclassified email accounts of senior US diplomats last year on the eve of Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s high-profile visit to China.

Wanting to influence public opinion in the face of detailed allegations from the US government, China is increasingly accusing the US government of carrying out cyberattacks on Chinese organizations.

Hacking and information operations are a common point of contention during bilateral meetings. As CNN previously reported, Chinese leader Xi Jinping told US President Joe Biden that China would not interfere in the 2024 presidential election when the two men met in California last year.