Microsoft: Chinese state-owned hackers have compromised critical US computer facilities

Microsoft warned on Wednesday that a Chinese state-sponsored hacker group – "Volt Typhoon" – has compromised US "critical" information infrastructure in several sectors, including manufacturing, construction, shipping, government, information technology and education .

The group, which has been operating since 2021, is reportedly working to disrupt "critical communications infrastructure between the United States and Asia" and to gather information, in order to weaken efforts during "future crises".

According to the notice from Microsoft, which has "directly notified affected or compromised customers," the attack is apparently underway. The company has urged affected customers to "close or change the credentials of all compromised accounts".

As Bloomberg notes , “Guam, an island territory of the United States located 1,600 miles (about 2,600 kilometers) east of Manila, has become an increasingly important military and strategic hub as tensions escalated with China, including the possibility that the latter will use its armed forces to assert its claim to the island of Taiwan, which it self-governs ".

According to Microsoft, Volt Typhoon initially gained access to targeted organizations through Internet-facing devices manufactured by Fortinet Inc., a Sunnyvale, California-based cybersecurity firm, adding that it is still investigating how the hackers have gained access to the equipment. The hackers used whatever privileges they could get from Fortinet devices to extract other credentials to authenticate to other devices on the networks, Microsoft said. There, the hackers intended “to espionage and maintain access undetected for as long as possible,” Microsoft added . -Bloomberg

Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security has warned that the CCP poses a "major threat" to the US homeland – and is actively working to undermine US security and damage America's economic standing, it said. by a senior official. The Communist Party of China (CPC), which rules China as a one-party state, seeks to leverage the entire Chinese nation against the United States, National Security Department assistant secretary Iranga Kahangama said.

"Beijing poses a particularly serious threat to the homeland," Kahangama said during a May 23 hearing of the House Internal Security Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement and Intelligence.

"We must live up to the resolve of our adversaries through a whole-of-government response, with DHS playing a leading role at the forefront of this defense every day."

To that end, Kahangama said the CCP regime "operates globally" and is "using all instruments of national power to strike at the United States" in its quest for global hegemony.

The United States, in response, must mobilize an all-out defense against this aggression. The methods employed by the regime to undermine US influence are too varied to justify any other response.

Many analysts are convinced that the CCP is actively acting, at every level, to undermine US security not only with cyber attacks, but also by exploiting major weaknesses in the American system and installing bases inside the United States, as was the case for the recently dismantled "Police Station" by the FBI in Manhattan. It is not clear how much of this is a real threat or how much is an overestimation of what is happening in the creeping all-out war between China and the USA.

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The Microsoft article: Chinese State Hackers Compromised Critical US Computer Facilities comes from Scenarios Economics .

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This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/microsoft-hacker-statali-cinesi-hanno-compromesso-strutture-informatiche-critiche-statunitensi/ on Thu, 25 May 2023 07:00:12 +0000.