The National Security Agency’s director stated on Sunday that while the Chinese breach of three significant telecom companies is being looked into, it is still “premature” to talk about the issue.
General Timothy Haugh of the Air Force stated that in order “to really understand what has happened,” his command would collaborate closely with other governmental departments and private businesses.
“I believe it is too soon for us to discuss this particular instance. Here at a conference hosted by the security website Cipher Brief, Haugh informed a small group of reporters that we’re really just getting started.
“I think we are in the early days of investigation,” he stated in response to news reports suggesting that Chinese hackers may have acquired access to networks used by federal officials for eavesdropping authorized by court.
The hack was initially disclosed on Saturday by The Wall Street Journal.
According to a source with knowledge of the situation, hackers supported by China may have attempted to obtain data from systems the federal government uses for court-approved electronic surveillance by breaking into at least three telecom companies: AT&T, Verizon, and Lumen Technologies.
Telecommunications providers have a legal responsibility to allow federal authorities to have access to electronic information if there is a court order for the eavesdropping. The wiretapping system would be seriously breached if China had access to it.
AT&T and Lumen declined to comment. An inquiry for comment from Sunday night was not immediately answered by Verizon.
A request for comment made Sunday night was not immediately answered by the Chinese Embassy in the United States.
Both the National Security Council of the White House and the FBI declined to comment.
Haugh claimed the NSA and other federal agencies released an advisory in 2022 warning that cyber operators backed by the Chinese government were seeking to target key telecommunications corporations and network service providers.
From a PRC [People’s Republic of China] threat standpoint, Haugh stated, “I think what we see broadly is that they’re going to be very aggressive at critical infrastructure collection operations and targeting our critical infrastructure.”
China’s cyber agents are “engaged every day in a deliberate campaign to steal our technology and target our national security systems and the defense industrial base,” according to Haugh, who made this statement earlier in the conference.
