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In a network of state-sponsored hackers from China, hackers linked to Beijing breached the emails of U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns, the Wall Street Journal first reported.
The email account of Daniel Kritenbrink, the assistant secretary of State for East Asia, was also accessed by hackers, people familiar with the matter told WSJ. One of the people said that the diplomats are the the State Department’s top senior officials targeted in the alleged cyber-espionage attack reported last week. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo’s email account was also breached by hackers.
Although the infiltration is reportedly limited to unclassified emails, the Biden adminstration believes hackers could have gained insight into U.S. planning ahead of Blinken’s trip to China in June and internal communications regarding U.S. policies, CNN reported.
The breach appeared to hone in on a select number of senior officials managing the U.S.-China relationship, and took advantage of a flaw in Microsoft’s cloud-computing environment that has since been fixed, per WSJ.
Security experts and former intelligence officials told WSJ that the timing of the cyber attack occurred during tense relations between the U.S. and China over the war in Ukraine, reports of China and Cuba negotiations to build a joint military training facility, and the shooting down of a Chinese spy balloonthat was found hovering above North America earlier this year.
“For security reasons, we will not be sharing additional information on the nature and scope of this cybersecurity incident at this time,” a State Department spokesman told the outlet. “The department continuously monitors and responds to activity of concern on our networks. Our investigation is ongoing, and we cannot provide further details at this time.”
