The head of the UK’s cyber spy agency said China is a threat to internet securities and warned Beijing could control the “global operating system” if Western powers do not act.
“Significant technology leadership is moving East,” said GCHQ chief Jeremy Fleming said on Friday. “The concern is that China’s size and technological weight means that it has the potential to control the global operating system,” he said, adding that the UK and its allies are facing a “moment of reckoning.”
Beijing fired back at the comments on Friday, pointing to the US’s history of global surveillance and hacking. “Western countries, such as the UK and US, are actually the true empires of hacking and tapping,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian.
The US often accuses countries like China and Russia of cyberattacks, but rarely offers evidence to back up the claims, something Zhao mentioned. “I’d like to stress that given the virtual nature of cyberspace and the fact that there are all kinds of online actors who are difficult to trace, it’s importance to have enough evidence when investigating and identifying cyber-related incidents,” he said.
The US accuses China of setting up backdoors through communication networks and has black-listed Chinese tech firms over the claim. Most notable is Huawei, which has been banned from the US and the UK.
Like many accusations Washington makes, the US is guilty of putting backdoors in global communications networks for surveillance purposes, as revealed by the 2013 Edward Snowden leaks. Those leaks also revealed that the US was struggling to set up backdoors on Huawei devices, which could be one reason the US pressures its allies to ban the firm.
According to a Snowden document obtained by The New York Times and Der Spiegel, the NSA hacked Huawei’s main servers in 2007.
The NSA viewed the increasing amount of internet communications going through Huawei as a “unique” threat to the agency’s ability to conduct surveillance. “Many of our targets communicate over Huawei produced products, we want to make sure that we know how to exploit these products,” the NSA document said.
rule of law?
where?
1984
everywhere
wrapped in bs
hypocrisy
double-standards
who’s kidding whom? https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/bdeb4d04eea61fef6b6ee2c65a00bb0af6187d121bedd16c14fbf83fec15489f.jpg
Yes, the US leads the way in hacking and cyberwar, and is proud of it whenever it gets any discussion. It gets big assists from a few allies, Britain and Israel included. Of course, all US allies are also targets too. The US knows no limits, even among friends.
So China is right to say this. That does not excuse indulging in its own hacking and cyberwar attacks.
Should they remain clean while the US offends against them? That is not what I’m saying. There needs to be an agreement not to war on each other. There needs to be peace made. Instead, China just counterattacks. Understandable, even justified, but not the right answer.
Putin has repeatedly called for dialogue and agreements, even treaties, with the West to reign in cyber attacks. So far the US has declined to show interest.
There is no doubt that China would join in since such a move squares with its foreign policy.
The most damaging cyberattack we know of to date – Stuxnet, courtesy of Israel and the US contra Iran. And it got out of hand doing damage far and wide, including in the US. Helluva job, USA.
Nothing strange here. The US hackers blame the victim and are determined to destroy the same.
“Significant technology leadership is moving east?” Really?!?! You don’t say?!?! The question we should be asking is, Whose to blame? Oh, and by the way, all it takes is a little basic research to discover the list of things that China exports to the USA and the list of things that the USA exports to China. It’s a bit lopsided you might say.
Good. Exports are a cost, not a benefit.