Chinese Hackers

[kyonides]

China Plays Victim After Getting Caught Hacking into U.S. Infrastructure for Years

China’s state-run Global Times studiously avoided mentioning the bombshell reports about Volt Typhoon, the Chinese state hacking group disrupted by Microsoft security experts and the FBI last week.

Volt Typhoon’s hackers penetrated critical infrastructure systems, including ports, oil pipelines, and power grids, then lurked in waiting without stealing data or causing damage – presumably waiting for an order from Beijing to cause havoc if the U.S. was drawn into a confrontation with China. The likely theater for such a confrontation would be Taiwan, whose infrastructure was also compromised by the Volt Typhoon operation.

Leaving all of that unsaid, the Global Times used a Wednesday editorial to rail against “American advanced persistent threat (APT) organizations” supposedly working indiscriminately around the globe.

Humorously citing “Chinese experts” who suddenly discovered American hackers everywhere the day after the FBI took Beijing’s big cyber-espionage operation down, the Global Times huffed into its editorial paper bag about the “uncontrolled development of the U.S. in terms of cybersecurity threats,” none of which its “Chinese experts” could actually describe.

Instead, the Global Times quoted Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin muttering that America is the “source of all evils” in terms of cyber-threats, then pumped out ten paragraphs of dark speculation about all the things the United States could do if it chose to unleash the dark wizards sitting restlessly at their keyboards in the CIA’s basement and NSA’s attic.
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Another frequent target of Chinese cyber-espionage is the Philippines, which is pushing back against Chinese aggression in the South China Sea. Last week, Chinese hackers tried to break into Philippine government websites and email accounts, including those of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and a maritime security agency.

The Philippines provided evidence the attack came from China, then very tactfully said it was “appealing to the Chinese government to help us prevent further attacks.”

The Global Times responded on Wednesday with another howling screed accusing Philippine hackers of victimizing poor, helpless China.

This time, the Chinese Communist paper briefly acknowledged the allegations of wrongdoing against China but dismissed them with a wave of its hand and insisted “China is the biggest victim of cyberattacks”...