Chinese government hackers breached a highly sensitive office in the Treasury Department that administers economic sanctions against countries and groups of individuals, according to U.S. officials. https://t.co/Hc45NhhBMH

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) January 2, 2025

How do they know? Did the alleged hackers leave a note?

No evidence, unfortunately.

But you can believe them because why would they even lie? What do they have to gain by lying and accusing this foreign country of things they didn’t do?

The Washington Post:

Chinese government hackers breached a highly sensitive office in the Treasury Department that administers economic sanctions against countries and groups of individuals — one of the most potent tools possessed by the United States to achieve national security aims, according to U.S. officials.

The targeting of the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) as well as the Office of the Treasury Secretary — developments not previously reported — reflects Beijing’s determination to acquire intelligence on its most significant rival in the global competition for power and influence, said the officials, who like others interviewed for this report spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.

A top area of interest for the Chinese government, current and former officials said, would be Chinese entities that the U.S. government may be considering designating for financial sanctions.

The hack also compromised the Treasury Department’s Office of Financial Research, according to the officials. The full impact of the breach, which was disclosed by Treasury in a letter to Congress on Monday, is still being assessed. The documents accessed were unclassified and there is no evidence the hacker still has access to Treasury systems, the department said.

A spokesman for the Treasury Department declined to comment. The Chinese foreign ministry has called claims of the breach “groundless,” and said that Beijing “has always opposed all forms of hacker attacks.”

See: China Replies to Retardo US Government Claim of Hacking Their Mainframe

Even unclassified documents can be very useful to a competitor like China, current and former officials said.

A breach of OFAC, in particular, could lead to the disclosure of sensitive information about government sanctions deliberations. Before designating a target, OFAC compiles an “administrative record” that purports to show how the evidence collected meets the statutory or regulatory criteria for designation.

The records can include everything from open-source materials to “law enforcement sensitive” information and classified material provided by U.S. or foreign law enforcement, according to four former government officials. The unclassified materials are frequently stored on the government’s unclassified systems, and these may include emails or communications with other agencies and units within Treasury.

Classified material and law enforcement sensitive information, such as the identities of secret law enforcement sources, are stored separately.

But there is enough in the unclassified record that could enable an adversary to glean useful insights into how the United States is developing sanctions on foreign targets, as well as the identities of potential targets for designation. Indeed, the unclassified information in the administrative record is used to compile the news release that Treasury issues after a designation that names the person or entity being sanctioned and why.

“Gaining access to even unclassified information held by OFAC could provide the Chinese government with valuable intelligence, as such information is used to build a case for sanctioning organizations and individuals,” said David Laufman, who previously oversaw sanctions enforcement in the Justice Department’s National Security Division.

Sure, the government is admitting that the information was worthless, and obviously the Chinese are capable of going for much higher value targets, but maybe they did this by accident or something.

It all makes perfect sense.

China reacts on ‘Treasury-Hack’ pic.twitter.com/7j7OaQ6eKD

— Willem Middelkoop (@wmiddelkoop) January 2, 2025

China’s foreign ministry has dismissed hacking allegations by the U.S. as “groundless” which “lack evidence.”

Speaking at a regular news conference, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said China has "always opposed all forms of hacker attacks”.#China #US #Treasury pic.twitter.com/if0NajBFjE

— CGTN Europe (@CGTNEurope) December 31, 2024

Previously: Lying Jewmerica Accuses China of Hacking Their Base, Does Not Provide Evidence

The Jewnited Snakes is claiming that the Chinese backtraced them and then cracked the firewall to violate the mainframe.

There is no evidence, of course, but why would the US government ever lie?

What would they have to gain by lying?

The Guardian:

Beijing has hit back at accusations that a China state-sponsored actor was behind a cyber breach at the US treasury department, calling the claims “groundless”.

The breach was orchestrated via a third-party cybersecurity service provider. Hackers were able to gain access to a key used by the vendor to override certain parts of the system, according to a letter the treasury department sent to lawmakers on Monday.

According to the treasury, the incident happened earlier this month, when the actor was able to remotely access workstations and some unclassified documents.

On Tuesday, China denied the claims, with the foreign ministry saying Beijing “has always opposed all forms of hacker attacks, and we are even more opposed to the spread of false information against China for political purposes”.

“We have stated our position many times regarding such groundless accusations that lack evidence,” the foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said.

Yeah, you would wonder if they should provide evidence of their claims, I guess.

But the fact is, we can believe the US government because they’ve never lied before. No one employed by the US government has ever lied before. When you are listening to the government, you might as well be reading the Bible, because it is literally divine truth.

Therefore, they can accuse anyone of anything without providing evidence.

Hacking attribution is always a joke.

Even proving a hack happened is effectively impossible, especially if nothing is even leaked. Even if something is leaked, the people claiming to have been hacked might have just hacked it themselves.

Insofar as hacking does occur, governments simply should not talk about it. Obviously, the US hacks every country, and you don’t see every country going around complaining about it. Instead, you hear about measures to prevent it.

When the US government accuses a country they are starting a war with of hacking their base, this is not serious adult behavior, and anyone who believes it should be ridiculed and otherwise bullied.

RT:

Alleged state-sponsored Chinese hackers have infiltrated the US Treasury Department, gaining access to unclassified documents and certain workstations used by government employees, according to a letter sent by the department to lawmakers on Monday.

The Treasury Department was alerted to the breach on December 8 by BeyondTrust, a third-party software service provider. The hackers obtained a security key used by the vendor to secure a cloud-based service that remotely provides technical support for Treasury Departmental Offices (DO) end users. With this key, the perpetrators were able to override the service’s security, remotely access specific workstations, and gain access to unclassified documents maintained on those systems.

“Based on available indicators, the incident has been attributed to a Chinese state-sponsored Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor,” the Treasury Department stated in a formal letter dated December 30.

The department classified this breach as a major cybersecurity incident and has collaborated with the FBI, the intelligence community, and other investigators to assess the hack’s impact. The compromised service has been taken offline, and there is no evidence that the perpetrators still have access to Treasury information.

They just make this stuff up, whole cloth.

Remember a few months ago when Alex Karp, the Jewish CEO of military tech (spying and AI) startup Palantir announced that the only way forward for the US is do a 3-front war with Russia, China, and Iran?

‘The US will very likely fight a 3-front war against Russia, China and Iran, Palantir’s Alex Karp says’

CIA funded data mining company Palantir is supplying Israel’s military & intel agencies with AI systems which generate targets at an unprecedented rate https://t.co/NNCa2Wj6kI pic.twitter.com/0faINK9HOu

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) August 19, 2024

It might be convenient that this will make him a lot of money, but it’s also necessary for America.

Earlier this month, he attended a pro-war event at the Reagan Library and made psychopath type statements about how everyone in the world should be afraid that Americans are going to “do very bad things to them.”

He is now a big Trump-supporter. He’s in with Elon and Vivek.

As everyone is probably aware, Palantier’s co-founder Peter Thiel was the primary backer and former employer of JD Vance.

It seems likely, or possibly inevitable, that in the first year of the Trump Administration there is going to be a massive push by all of these Silicon Valley people to escalate tensions with the Chinese. Aside from making a lot of money off of “defense,” these people now rightly view China as a major business competitor, and simply getting the American people to fight a war for them is a lot easier than outperforming them.

You’ll see many more stupid “Chinese hacker” stories that sound like they were written for babies. You may even hear that a Chinaman played a joke and went peepee in Donald’s Diet Coke. That is the level of adultness the US is operating on at this point.

2/ Another bombshell: a reported device compromise…

As if the #SaltTyphoon breach wasn’t already at worst-case-scenario… this report suggests that the attackers may have, naturally enough, been expanding their access beyond interception and onto phones. pic.twitter.com/P6dkbnNbGm

— John Scott-Railton (@jsrailton) October 27, 2024

Previously: NYT Claims Without Evidence That China Hacked Phones of Trump and James Bowman

Remember when it was against the law to report on the Hunter Biden laptop because they said it was a hack?

The Guardian:

Chinese state-affiliated hackers intercepted audio from the phone calls of US political figures, including an unnamed campaign adviser of Donald Trump, the Washington Post reported Sunday.

Various media outlets reported on Friday that the Trump campaign was made aware last week that the Republican presidential candidate and his running mate JD Vance were among a number of people inside and outside of government whose phone numbers were targeted through the infiltration of Verizon phone systems.

The FBI and the US cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency confirmed they were investigating unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by people associated with China, though they did not not name the Trump campaign in the statement.

Reuters later reported that Chinese hackers also targeted phones used by people affiliated with the campaign of Kamala Harris.

The Post now reports that the hackers were able to access audio from a phone call from a Trump campaign adviser, as well as unencrypted communications such as text messages of the individual.

Attributing hackings is so stupid. Everyone who does hacking uses tools created by the CIA and the Mossad, because when the CIA or the Mossad uses the hacks, they expose them and others can capture them and use them. This was all in CIA documents released by Wikileaks.

It’s an absolute matter of fact that you can’t attribute hacking. It’s not possible. But the media constantly does this, because very few people understand what hacking is, so they can just lie.

It’s more likely that the CIA or the Mossad did the hack and then blamed China so as to drum-up tension. Trump is already talking about a war with the Chinese.

Trump on a possible war with China: “We would kick their ass.” pic.twitter.com/MKjc0SwVJl

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 27, 2024

How are you going to fight a war against a country with a billion people? Are you going to invade? Carpet bomb Beijing and Shanghai, and just hope they don’t retaliate? It doesn’t even make any sense.

The US can’t even maintain their proxy war in the Ukraine.

They recently surrendered to a group of mountain people in Afghanistan.

How are they going to fight China?

Why are we talking about this?

What did China do that is real, which you can prove?

You have a weather balloon hoax, now hacking hoaxes, you have all these other hoaxes, with stupid Holocaust gibberish.

What are we talking about here?

BREAKING: AP sources: Chinese hackers targeted cellphones used by Trump, Vance https://t.co/2gI7BYskmm

— The Associated Press (@AP) October 25, 2024

The hacking service that the Israelis sell publicly allows you to hack someone’s phone by simply getting them to click a link. It’s not hard for any state to do this.

But I thought Iran was the one hacking Trump?

The Guardian:

Chinese government-linked hackers are believed to have targeted phones used by Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, as part of a larger breach of US telecommunications networks, according to a New York Times report.

The Trump campaign was informed this week that the phone numbers of the Republican presidential and vice-presidential nominee were among those targeted during a breach of the Verizon network, the paper said, citing sources.

Investigators are working to determine what data, if any, was accessed by the “sophisticated” hack, the sources said. Other current and former government officials were also targeted, according to the report.

The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency confirmed an investigation was under way into the “unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by actors affiliated with the People’s Republic of China”. It did not name the Trump campaign in the statement.

…

In a statement, a Trump campaign spokesperson, Steven Cheung, criticized the White House and Trump’s opponent, Kamala Harris, and sought to blame them for allowing a foreign adversary to target the campaign, the Times reported.

Hacking attribution is always retarded, even if you can prove something was hacked.

The Times is not proving anyone was hacked, but they’re going ahead and doing attribution. I get that they are just publishing a press release from the government as they always do (the AP is reporting the same thing), but the same is true of the government. No one can accurately attribute a hack.

This was all in CIA WikiLeaks documents many years ago: when you use a hack on the internet, other people can steal the hack itself and use it themselves against other targets. So anyone involved in this has all of the CIA’s hacks and the Israeli ones. The documents also admitted that there was no way to know who was using what software.

That said, presumably every big country is hacking every other country all the time.

It is a bit like the pot calling the kettle a nigger when the US claims that everyone in the world is hacking them – even if it were true that everyone in the world was hacking them, which we have no evidence of.

Because what we do have evidence of is Crypto AG, an international cryptology company out of Switzerland that was run by the CIA for the purpose of hacking everyone on earth.

RT:

Washington accusing other states of leading cyberwarfare against the US is like “a thief crying ‘stop, thief!’” Beijing said, reacting to revelations the CIA used Swiss cryptography firm Crypto AG to spy on hundreds of countries.

The US government has “conducted large-scale, organized and indiscriminate cyber theft, tapping and surveillance on foreign governments, businesses and individuals, a fact already well-known to all,” China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Geng Shuang said at a daily briefing in Beijing.

These spying activities, which violate international law and undermine trust between the US and other nations, had been unmasked by whistleblower Edward Snowden and by WikiLeaks – a fact Geng was also keen to remind the audience of. Among other things, the Americans have been collecting billions of phonecalls around the globe on a daily basis and were even revealed to be spying on German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s phone.

The Chinese official pointed out that Washington never explained itself over those leaks and “now the Crypto AG incident adds… one more thing for the US to clarify to the world.”

Last week, the Washington Post revealed that the US had been using a Swiss encryption company, Crypto AG, to monitor “secure” communications between as many as 120 countries since the 1970s and well into 2000s. The firm sold “encrypted” devices to government agencies worldwide, but was secretly owned by the CIA and then-West German intelligence. The Americans hailed the operation as the “intelligence coup of the century.”

“Facts have proven time and again that as the largest state actor of espionage in the cyber space, the US is worthy of the name of ‘Empire of Hackers.'”

Geng said the US has “no credibility” in accusing other countries of hacking and spying, but it “keeps playing the victim of cyberattack[s], like a thief crying ‘stop thief’!”

“It’s hypocrisy on the issue of cyber security [that] could not be clearer,” he added.

The US also accuses others of using Facebook ads to “meddle” in their elections, all the while they are running entire media conglomerates in every language on earth for the purpose of trying to change the internal politics of other countries.

They also run entire schools for the purpose of training people to rebel against their own governments. All of the leaders of the Hong Kong riots, for example, were from Western-backed schools in Hong Kong, most of them funded directly by the State Department through the National Endowment for Democracy. Literally “US Government sponsored domestic terrorism.”

And yet somehow, these people think they have a moral right to claim that they are the victims of the entire world.

The United States government cries out “democracy hacker” as it hacks your democracies.

Of course, the bottom line is that anyone has a “right” to do anything they can get away with doing, and the population of the United States is apparently so stupid that the US government can get away with all of these hoaxes and people just say “yeah must be true, I heard it on CNN and then I read the same thing in the New York Times.”

Oh so now Chinese hackers.

Who could have predicted this?

Washington Post:

The Chinese government has flatly denied — again — any suggestion that its operatives are conducting cyberattacks or espionage in the United States, following the Justice Department’s move to charge four members of the Chinese military with a 2017 hack of the Equifax credit reporting agency.

The massive data breach compromised the personal information, including Social Security numbers and birth dates, of about 145 million people — or nearly half of all Americans.

Prosecutors alleged in a nine-count indictment filed Monday in federal court in Atlanta that four members of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) hacked into Equifax’s systems. They are accused of stealing the personal data as well as company trade secrets in what Attorney General William P. Barr called “a deliberate and sweeping intrusion into the private information of the American people.”

Asked about the allegations in Beijing on Tuesday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang responded with a staunch denial.

“We firmly oppose and combat cyberattacks of any kind. China is a staunch defender of cybersecurity,” he told journalists during a briefing conducted over the WeChat social media app because the coronavirus makes it dangerous to congregate.

“The Chinese government, military and relevant personnel never engage in cybertheft of trade secrets,” he wrote.

Accusing people of hacking is like accusing them of witchcraft. There is no way to prove it and no way to disprove it, so you simply have to take the word of the priests that this is going on.

And that analogy is absolute. This is exactly what is going on. It is a modern version of witchcraft in every way. No one could understand witchcraft, so they had to trust the priest that it was going on. Just so, no one understands hacking, and just has to trust the priestly intelligence class that it is happening.

Furthermore, accusations of witchcraft could be true. Just like accusations of hacking could be true. But no one knows either way and anyone can be accused of it and there isn’t any defense from such accusations.

Presumably, every government hacks every other country, simply because it can never be proven, so why wouldn’t they?

But the US was the first country to just start using this witchcraft insinuation as a core element of its foreign and domestic policy.

This is a completely irresponsible way to run a country.