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A Chinese state-sponsored actor hacked the U.S. Treasury Department through a third-party vendor in a “major cybersecurity incident,” the agency said Monday.
In a letter to the Senate Banking Committee, obtained by the Financial Times, the Treasury Department said it was informed on December 8 by software company BeyondTrust that a hacker had breached several remote government workplaces by obtaining a security key and in return gained access to unclassified documents about it.
“Based on available indicators, the incident was attributed to a state-sponsored Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor in China,” the letter said. “According to Treasury Department guidelines, intrusions resulting from an APT are considered a major cybersecurity incident.”
The department said it worked with the FBI and other investigators in the broader intelligence community to determine the impact of the hack. It added that “there is currently no evidence that the threat actor continues to have access to Treasury Department information.”
In a separate statement Monday, a Treasury Department spokesman said the agency “takes all threats against our systems and the data stored therein very seriously.”
“We will continue to work with private and public sector partners to protect our financial system from threat actors,” the person added.
The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The breach is the latest cybersecurity breach against US targets allegedly committed on behalf of China.
In October, the Biden administration said this was the case investigate What the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said was “unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by actors affiliated with the People’s Republic of China.” Hackers have reportedly targeted the phones of President-elect Donald Trump and his Vice President JD Vance ahead of the US elections.
The Commerce Department underscored the extent of the concern in September steps taken Limiting China’s access to Americans’ data by proposing a ban on Chinese software and hardware for vehicles with built-in internet connectivity.
