A group of hackers with backing from the Chinese government broke past the security of multiple US telecom firms, including AT&T and Verizon, and potentially accessed data used by law enforcement officials. Specifically, the hackers appear to have targeted information about court-authorized wiretaps, which could be related to multiple ongoing cases in the US concerning Chinese government agents intimidating and harassing people in the US.
The hack was carried out by a group known as Salt Typhoon, one of many such units used by the Chinese government to infiltrate overseas networks. Investigators from Microsoft and a Google subsidiary have been helping investigate the breach alongside the FBI, whose cybersecurity agents are reportedly outnumbered by their Chinese opponents 50:1.
Will the hack undermine US-China relations? Both sides have been trying to keep tensions under control — largely successfully — all year, but this incident may be too awkward to smooth over. China’s Embassy in Washington, DC, denied the hack and accused the US of “politicizing cybersecurity issues to smear China,” and the FBI and DOJ have not commented. We’re watching how the fallout might affect a notional Biden-Xi phone call the White House has reportedly been attempting to arrange.