A recent report from U.S. security groups revealed that Chinese hacking groups had maintained access to U.S. infrastructure systems for at least five years before being discovered.
The hackers’ goal was to gain control over critical infrastructure, posing a potential threat in the event of a conflict between the U.S. and China.
The Joint Cybersecurity Advisory said hackers accessed ,”Communications, Energy, Transportation Systems, and Waste and Wastewater Systems Sectors — in the continental and non-continental United States and its territories.”
The Advisory stated the “choice of targets and pattern of behavior is not consistent with traditional cyber espionage or intelligence gathering operations.”
“The U.S. authoring agencies are concerned about the potential for these actors to use their network access for disruptive effects in the event of potential geopolitical tensions and/or military conflicts,” their report continues.
FBI Director Christopher Wray said, “There has been far too little public focus on the fact that PRC [People’s Republic of China] hackers are targeting our critical infrastructure — our water treatment plants, our electrical grid, our oil and natural gas pipelines, our transportation systems. And the risk that poses to every American requires our attention now.”
“China’s hackers are positioning on American infrastructure in preparation to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm to American citizens and communities, if or when China decides the time has come to strike,” he continued.
The report emphasized that the hackers’ behavior was not consistent with traditional espionage, and FBI Director Christopher Wray has repeatedly raised concerns about China’s cyber threat to American infrastructure, urging lawmakers to pay more attention to the issue.
Wray previously said, “To give you a sense of what we’re up against, if each one of the FBI’s cyber agents and intel analysts focused exclusively on the China threat — on nothing but China — Chinese hackers would still outnumber FBI cyber personnel by at least 50 to 1.”
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