The Chinese government denied its operatives were behind a massive data breach of a credit reporting agency after the Justice Department charged four members of the Chinese military for their role in the 2017 Equifax hack.
“The Chinese government, military, and relevant personnel never engage in cybertheft of trade secrets,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said Tuesday, according to the Washington Post. “We firmly oppose and combat cyberattacks of any kind. China is a staunch defender of cybersecurity.”
In a nine-count indictment on Monday, Justice Department prosecutors alleged that four members of the People’s Liberation Army (Wu Zhiyong, Wang Qian, Xu Ke, and Liu Lei) hacked into Equifax’s systems and stole massive amounts of information. The breach compromised the personal information of nearly half of all Americans, including their Social Security numbers and birth dates.
Attorney General William Barr said the stolen information had “economic value” and could help the country in intelligence gathering.
“This is the largest theft of sensitive, personally identifiable information by state sponsors ever recorded,” FBI Deputy Director David Bowdich said.
None of those charged are in custody and aren’t likely to be arrested any time soon. U.S. officials said the charges serve to shame those responsible publicly and would allow the United States to arrest them if they travel.
The U.S. has previously blamed hackers working on behalf of the Chinese government for the 2015 hack of the Office of Personnel Management and health insurer Anthem, as well as the 2018 breach of the Marriott hotel chain.
Geng said China was a “victim” of American hacking.
“It has long been an open secret that relevant departments in the U.S., in violation of international law and basic norms governing international relations, have been engaging in large-scale, organized, and indiscriminate cyber stealing, spying, and surveillance activities on foreign governments, enterprises, and individuals,” he said, pointing to WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden as examples of American “hypocrisy and double standards” on cybersecurity.
