White House holds emergency meeting with telecoms over ‘massive’ Chinese breach
November 25, 2024 1 Comment
THE WHITE HOUSE HELD an emergency meeting on Friday with senior telecommunications industry officials to discuss the fallout from a Chinese cyber espionage operation described as “massive” by experts. The existence of the operation was revealed last month by Microsoft engineers, who claimed that it was orchestrated by Salt Typhoon, a Chinese government-linked hacker group.
On Thursday, following a briefing provided by intelligence officials, Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), who chairs the United States Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence, referred to the Chinese breach as “far and away the most serious telecom hack in [American] history”. Warner added that the volume of data the Chinese hackers were able to collect on “important American officials” was alarming, but that the extent of the intrusion was significantly broader than initially thought and compromised the privacy of telephone users across the United States.
According to reports, the breach affected a host of American telecommunications service providers (TSPs), including the three largest —T-Mobile, Verizon, and AT&T. The initial breach compromised the system employed by the TSPs to facilitate communications interception requests by government agencies following the issuance of court warrants. Eventually, however, the hackers were eventually able to exploit antiquated software and hardware in the United States’ national telecommunications network in order to target a wide array of users.
The extent of the damage caused by the breach remains unknown, as very little about it has been shared by the White House or the telecommunications industry. Nevertheless, it appears that the hackers selected telephone service users with senior current or former posts in government, including President-Elect Donald Trump. The hackers were reportedly able to access the metadata, and even content, of all unencrypted telephone calls and text messages to and from these users.
Friday’s meeting at the White House was reportedly convened by National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and co-led by Anne Neuberger, who is serving as Deputy National Security Adviser for Cyber and Emerging Technology. The names of telecommunications industry executives that attended the closed-door meeting were not provided to the media.
► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 25 November 2024 | Permalink
intelNews.org 
Using Western terms Salt Typhoon might be a group directed by China’s NSA. That NSA would include staff seconded from China’s civilian MSS and from military (PLA) intelligence.
Through Salt Typhoon the data gathered by China’s NSA (using cutouts and false flags) could be used to blackmail some of the “important American officials”. Against senior US intelligence officials China might also have gained a better handle on what diplomatic and natural cover those officials may have used during their junior-middle careers.
Data collected by China’s NSA on “interception requests by [US] government agencies following the issuance of court warrants.” would be very useful if the warrants concerned US citizens suspected of working for Chinese and Russian intelligence. Using this data China might decide to wind up some of its intelligence operations in the US if China judged they were compromised.
China might also be inclined to exchange some of the intelligence on Russia with Russian intelligence.
Looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_Typhoon In October 2024
“The New York Times reported that Salt Typhoon attempted to and may have gained access to the phones of staff of the Kamala Harris 2024 presidential campaign as well as those of Donald Trump and JD Vance.”
It would appear from the above that Trump, Vance and their staffs might have to go outside their comfort zones by having to rely on advice from “deep state” US NSA and the FBI on ways to minimize the security damage of this successful Chinese operation.