China is also focused on commercial sectors critical to U.S. infrastructure, but vulnerable to cyberattack.[1] The U.S. Trade Representative recently warned that "cyber theft [was] one of China's preferred methods of collecting commercial information because of its . . . plausible deniability."[2] Many of the targeted companies operate in sectors that China believes are important for future innovation, such as information technology.[3] In 2014, then-Director of the National Security Agency, Admiral Michael Rogers, warned that China was capable of shutting down the U.S. electric grid and other critical infrastructure systems via cyberattack.[4] Just last year, cyber security experts attributed a cyberattack on the National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying to Chinese state hacker-group APT10.[5] These experts warned that the attack was indicative of a specific threat to U.S. utility providers—the attacks were highly targeted and designed to steal intellectual property or to plant vulnerabilities in sectors essential to everyday national operations, such as energy, utilities, and telecommunications.[6]
China's cyber and economic espionage efforts are not expected to subside in the coming years. The Director of National Intelligence has advised that the Chinese government "will authorize cyber espionage against key U.S. technology sectors when doing so addresses a significant national security or economic goal not achievable through other means."[7] In a recent hearing before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, David J. Glawe, Undersecretary of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis at DHS, testified that China "will remain aggressive" in its cyber efforts against the United States and will continue to use its cyber capabilities to "undermine critical infrastructure, target our livelihoods and innovation, steal our national security secrets, and threaten our democratic institutions."[8]
- ↑ Zack Doffman, Chinese State Hackers Suspected of Malicious Cyber Attack on U.S. Utilities, Forbes (Aug. 3, 2019); U.S.-China Econ. & Sec. Review Comm'n, 2016 Report to Congress 1, 298–300 (Nov. 2016) (defining critical infrastructure to include the information technology sector).
- ↑ 2018 U.S. Trade Representative Report, supra note 15, at 153.
- ↑ Council on Foreign Relations, A New Old Threat: Countering the Return of Chinese Industrial Cyber Espionage (Dec. 6, 2018).
- ↑ Ken Dilanian, NSA Director: China Can Damage U.S. Power Grid, Associated Press (Nov. 20, 2014).
- ↑ Zack Doffman, Chinese State Hackers Suspected of Malicious Cyber Attack on U.S. Utilities, Forbes (Aug. 3, 2019).
- ↑ Id.
- ↑ Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community Statement for the Record to the S. Select Comm. on Intelligence 5 (Jan. 29, 2019) (statement of Daniel R. Coats, Dir. of Nat'l Intelligence).
- ↑ Threats to the Homeland: Hearing before the S. Comm. on Homeland Sec. & Governmental Affairs, 116 Cong. (2019) (statement of David J. Glawe, Undersec'y, Office of Intelligence & Analysis, U.S. Dep't of Homeland Sec.).
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