Unusually, the series of cyber-attacks allegedly carried out on the orders of the Chinese state party has been condemned.
The hack of the so-called “Microsoft Exchange servers” appeared in March 2021. According to experts
The cyber attack allowed hackers to access global computer networks through servers.
It is estimated that the hacker attack affected more than a quarter of a million servers and more than 30,000 organizations, businesses, and local governments around the world.
US President Joe Biden on Monday accused Chinese authorities of “protecting” the perpetrators of cyber-attacks. They were “encouraged,” he said in a conversation at the White House.
Since taking office in January 2021, the US president has been continually urging tough action against China. The already tense relationship between Washington and Beijing has become more hostile since the beginning of the summer after that
The Biden administration has repeatedly warned China and imposed sanctions on China for its hacking attacks and political action.
Washington issued a warning to companies operating in Hong Kong after Beijing imposed restrictions on a traditionally affected but partially independent financial centre. The US Senate voted to pass a law banning products from China’s Xinjiang province to condemn “forced labor” against the Uyghur Muslim minority.
As Joe Biden warned Russian President Vladimir Putin in June and July of this
Moscow faces dire consequences if it does not take action against extortionate attackers, who typically control a company’s data file or computer system and demand payment for the release of data or control of the system.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said in a statement on Monday that the cyber attack on Microsoft Exchange servers resulted in the highest number of victims in the business community. The statement states that China’s Ministry of State Security “used an entire system (ecosystem) of contract criminal hackers who carried out state-supported activities and cybercrime for their own financial gain.”
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Britain and the European Union also responded in a statement on Monday to the hack of Microsoft Exchange servers.
The European Union, which in addition to Russia hit China with its first cyber attack last year, said in a statement that the incident “compromised the security and safety of thousands of computers and networks around the world”.
Britain, which was previously more reluctant to condemn China’s hostile activities than the United States, said for the first time on Monday that it said Chinese hacking groups called “APT 40” and “APT 31” were linked to China’s Ministry of State Security. .
An earlier statement from the Microsoft administration said that a group of hackers called “Hafnium” backed by a partisan state of China exploited a vulnerability in the tech giant’s computer system.
According to an article in the British business newspaper Financial Times, US officials say “with great confidence” that cybercriminals linked to China carried out the attack on Microsoft Exchange servers.
According to the British newspaper, the US Department of Justice has also issued an indictment. This document alleges that four Chinese nationals affiliated with China’s Ministry of State Security also ran another online campaign, independent of Microsoft Exchange servers, for more than seven years, involving companies in the United States and abroad in aerospace and defense, medical editors, and pharmaceuticals, and universities and offices were hacked. government between 2011 and 2018.
According to the US indictment, the Chinese hacker group “APT 40”, also known as “Bronze”, stole information about sensitive technologies such as
Self-driving cars, commercial airline service, and research for some infectious diseases (Ebola, MERS, HIV).
According to a prestigious paper, senior US government officials emphasized that “the criminal activity of Chinese hackers affiliated with China’s Ministry of Homeland Security includes cyber extortion, siphoning of digital currencies, and theft for financial gain anywhere in the world.”
The coordinated and simultaneous release of Monday’s convictions represents a new united front for Washington in the fight against a growing number of extortion virus attacks. By carrying out these attacks, hacker groups allegedly operating in Russia have been the most accused so far.
Beijing called the accusations slanderous
The Western campaign is entirely politically motivated, said Zhao Liqin, spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, at a press conference on Tuesday, about China’s demise and pressure on it. He added that Washington had not found enough evidence to “prove the slander.”
At a press conference on Tuesday, Japanese government spokeswoman Kato Kakunobo said Japanese companies were also targeted with cyberattacks by a group of hackers known as “APT 40,” linked to China’s Ministry of Homeland Security on Monday.
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