The US Department of Justice has accused two people it believes to be Chinese state agents of paying an FBI double agent to get information about the Huawei probe. The two individuals are accused of attempting to influence a US government employee who they thought was a cooperator to disclose sensitive information regarding the Justice Department’s investigation, including details about prospective witnesses, trial evidence, and additional charges that may be brought. According to the Justice Department, one of the defendants paid nearly $61,000 in digital currency for the data. However, the individual they attempted to bribe was an FBI double agent. The double agent gave the Chinese operatives certain documents that seemed to contain some of the material they were looking for, but the documents were created by the Justice Department and did not disclose factual meetings or trial tactics. Although the department has filed arrest warrants…
Chinese government-backed hackers have attacked major telecoms businesses throughout the world in a cyber-espionage effort that has lasted at least two years and has successfully compromised at least 13 telecommunications groups. In a recent advisory, the FBI, NSA and CISA stated that hackers linked to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) had targeted and hacked major telecommunications businesses by exploiting simple and well-known network and system vulnerabilities. According to the report, Chinese espionage is often initiated with hackers surveying target networks and exploring the manufacturers, models, versions, and known vulnerabilities of routers and networking equipment using open-source scanning tools such as RouterSploit and RouterScan. The Chinese government consistently disputes charges of hacking. The statement from the American security agencies did not name the victims of the hacking, nor did it specify the extent of the damage. However, US authorities did list specific networking equipment, such as routers…