Chinese hacking of United States telecom networks raises concerns about the exploitation by hostile hacking groups of federal government backdoors to supply legal access to telecoms services
By
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Expense Goodwin, Computer Weekly
Released: 05 Dec 2024 17:30
United States federal government companies have actually been prompted to utilize end-to-end encrypted messaging services, consisting of WhatsApp, Signal and FaceTime, following disclosures that China has actually breached United States telephone networks in a hacking operation that weakens United States nationwide security.
In a letter to the United States Department of Defence (DOD), 2 popular senators cautioned the DOD is putting security at threat through its continued usage of unencrypted landlines, and unencrypted platforms such as Microsoft Teams.
The caution follows verification from the FBI and the United States Cyber Security and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) that groups connected to individuals’s Republic of China have actually jeopardized several telephone networks and had actually accessed personal interactions of a “minimal number” of individuals in federal government and politics in a hacking operation called Salt Typhoon.
Democratic senator Ron Wyden and republican Eric Schmitt criticised the defence department for stopping working to utilize its buying power to need cordless telephone company to offer cyber defences and responsibility, in a letter on 4 December 2024.
“DOD’s failure to protect its unclassified voice, video and text interactions with end-to-end file encryption has actually left it susceptible to foreign espionage,” they alerted.
United States Navy evaluates encrypted messaging
The senators divulged formerly categorized information of a trial by the United States Navy to evaluate end-to-end file encryption interactions platform Matrix, an open-source, decentralised service commonly utilized by Nato nations. The United States Navy is evaluating Matrix to send out encrypted messages from 23 ships and 3 on-shore websites.
“While we applaud the DOD for piloting such safe, interoperable interactions innovation, its usage stays the exception; insecure propriety tools within the DOD and the federal government typically,” the senators stated.
“The extensive adoption of insecure, proprietary tools is the direct outcome of DOD management stopping working to need using default end-to-end file encryption, a cyber security finest practice, along with a failure to prioritise interactions security when examining various interactions platforms.”
The Salt Typhoon attack, initially reported by the Wall Street Journalhas actually targeted people consisting of president-elect Donald Trump, vice-president-elect JD Vance and Senate bulk leader Chuck Schumer, according to push reports.
“This effective espionage project need to lastly function as a wake-up call to the federal government’s interactions security, regardless of duplicated cautions from specialists and Congress,” the senators composed.
The FBI and CISA have actually advised that individuals utilize encrypted messaging and voice services such as Signal and WhatsApp to lower the danger of hackers obstructing text.
CISA executive assistant director for cyber security Jeff Greene informed broadcaster NBC today: “Encryption is your buddy, whether it’s on text messaging or if you have the capability to utilize encrypted voice interaction.
