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Phone companies maintain records like which phone numbers participated in calls and when those calls happened and potentially the locations of the cell towers their phones connected to. Alan Butler, the executive director and president of the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center, said having one’s phone metadata exposed is a clear violation of privacy. The hacking campaign accessed the metadata of more than a million people, an industry source briefed on the matter said. While some consider phone metadata to be less sensitive than the contents of communications, it can still provide enormous value to intelligence services. That would not typically fall to CISA or the FBI,” the FBI official said.

Persons: Donald Trump, Kamala Harris, Chuck Schumer, Alan Butler, ” Butler, Verizon’s, ”, Michael Hayden, “, Dakota Cary, ” Cary, China’s, CISA, Jeff Simon, Simon Organizations: FBI, Verizon, NBC News, D.C, Privacy, Federal Communications Commission, White, Embassy, CIA, National Security Agency, Sentinel, National Capital, intel, White House, Infrastructure Security Agency, Typhoon, Charter Communications, Mobile, Salt Locations: U.S, Washington, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, China, Western, CISA, Louisiana, Salt

☆ The Salt Typhoon telecom hack targeted senior American political figures, the White House says
▼ + stars: | 2024-12-08 | by ( Kenneth Niemeyer | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The Salt Typhoon hack is one of the largest attacks on US telecommunications ever, officials say. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner told The Washington Post that the hack is the "worst telecom hack in our nation's history by far." Senior White House officials on the call said the hack has been ongoing for "likely one to two years." She added that the White House "has made it a priority for the federal government to do everything it can to get to the bottom of this." Neuberger said that White House leaders are meeting three times a week to discuss the hack.

Persons: Anne Neuberger, Mark Warner, Warner, Neuberger, Biden Organizations: Verizon, NSA, Microsoft, White House, Congressional Research Office, Lumen Technologies, NBC, Senate, Washington Post, New York Times, Justice Department, FBI, White Locations: China

For everyday consumers, the simplest way to send encrypted messages or make encrypted calls is to use communications apps like Signal or WhatsApp that have implemented end-to-end encryption between other Signal and WhatsApp users. Both apps also allow users to make encrypted phone calls with other users through the internet. If iMessage users text other iMessage users or Google Messages users text other Google Messages users, those chats are automatically encrypted with the Signal protocol. For phone calls, Google and Apple offer encryption if the calls are made through their internet-connected calling apps — Google Fi and FaceTime. In some circumstances, affecting members of both the Trump and Harris campaigns, as well as the office of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer D-N.Y., they were able to listen to phone calls.

Persons: FBI — it’s, Harris, Chuck Schumer D Organizations: FBI, Telecommunications, Microsoft, Google, Rich Communications Services, Apple, Salt Typhoon, Verizon, Lumen Technologies, D.C, Trump, China Locations: U.S, Washington, Western, China

A Chinese hacking campaign that has spied on the texts and calls of U.S. citizens by hacking telecommunications companies is significantly larger than previously known to the public, a top White House official said Wednesday. At least eight American telecommunications companies have been compromised, Anne Neuberger, a deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology at the National Security Council, said in a press call Wednesday. On Tuesday, agencies in the U.S., as well as in key allies Australia, Canada and New Zealand, released a public guide for telecommunications companies to protect themselves from China’s hackers. On a press call Tuesday about Salt Typhoon, an FBI official said the hackers were primarily interested in the call records of people in the Washington, D.C., area. The agency does not plan to notify all the Americans whose call records were accessed, however, the FBI official said.

Persons: Anne Neuberger, Neuberger, Harris, Chuck Schumer Organizations: White, National Security Council, NBC News, Verizon, Lumen Technologies, Salt Typhoon, FBI, D.C, Trump Locations: U.S, China, Washington, Australia, Canada, New Zealand

Amid an unprecedented cyberattack on telecommunications companies such as AT&T and Verizon, U.S. officials have recommended that Americans use encrypted messaging apps to ensure their communications stay hidden from foreign hackers. CALEA systems can include classified court orders from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which processes some U.S. intelligence court orders. The FBI official declined to say if any classified material was accessed. But the FBI has also supported forms of encryption that do allow for some law enforcement access in certain circumstances. Certainly the way they went about it was very, very specific about the telcos and the ISPs, but it fits into the cyber espionage bucket,” the FBI official said.

Persons: didn’t, —, Jeff Greene, ” Greene, Greene, Donald Trump, Kamala Harris, Chuck Schumer, “, Ron Wyden, ” Organizations: Verizon, Microsoft, NBC News, Lumen Technologies, Embassy, Washington , D.C, FBI, cybersecurity, Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Security Agency, D.C, Foreign Intelligence, Google Locations: China, Washington ,, Washington, United States

☆ China’s Hacking Reached Deep Into U.S. Telecoms
▼ + stars: | 2024-11-21 | by ( David E. Sanger | Julian E. Barnes | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

China’s recent breach of the innermost workings of the U.S. telecommunications system reached far deeper than the Biden administration has described, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee said on Thursday, with hackers able to listen in on telephone conversations and read text messages. “The barn door is still wide open, or mostly open,” the Democratic chairman, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, a former telecommunications executive, said in an interview on Thursday. and other investigators believed that China’s hackers used stolen passwords to focus mostly on the system that taps telephone conversations and texts under court orders. It is administered by a number of the nation’s telecommunications firms, including the three largest — Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile. But in recent days, investigators have discovered how deeply China’s hackers had moved throughout the country by exploiting aging equipment and seams in the networks connecting disparate systems.

Persons: Biden, Mark Warner of, Warner, Donald J, Trump, JD Vance Organizations: Senate Intelligence, Democratic, Microsoft, Verizon Locations: Mark Warner of Virginia, China

☆ Chinese hackers targeted Trump and Vance’s phone data
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-25 | by ( Sean Lyngaas | Kristen Holmes | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

The Chinese hackers also targeted people affiliated with the Harris-Walz campaign, another source familiar with the matter told CNN. US officials informed the Trump campaign this week that Trump and Vance were among a group of people whose phones were targeted by the Chinese hackers, one of the sources said. In a statement, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung attacked the Harris campaign for allegedly emboldening China. The activity is part of a much broader Chinese hacking campaign that has infiltrated multiple US telecommunications firms in the last several months. US officials have briefed members of the House and Senate intelligence committees on the Chinese hacking campaign.

Persons: Donald Trump, Vance, Harris, Walz, Trump, Steven Cheung, “, CISA “, ” Sen, Mark Warner, Mark Green Organizations: CNN, Senior Biden, U.S, Government, FBI, Infrastructure Security Agency, The New York Times, Justice Department, Trump, Major, Verizon, Lumen, Typhoon, Virginia Democrat, House Homeland Security, ”, Tennessee Republican Locations: China, People’s Republic of China, Iran, Russia

☆ China-linked security breach targeted U.S. wiretap systems, WSJ reports
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-05 | by ( Annie Nova | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

People observe the scenery near Chinese national flags displayed for National Day celebrations on October 3, 2024 in Chongqing, China. National Day Golden Week is a holiday in China commemorates the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949. U.S. broadband providers had their networks breached in a cyberattack tied to the Chinese government that targeted wiretap requests, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. The cyber breach, carried out by the Chinese hacking group known as Salt Typhoon, poses serious national security risks, the WSJ reported. Read The Wall Street Journal's article here.

Organizations: Wall Street, WSJ Locations: Chongqing, China, People's Republic of China, Western, U.S

☆ Chinese hackers access US telecom firms, worrying national security officials
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-05 | by ( Sean Lyngaas | Evan Perez | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

US officials are concerned about the potential national security damage done by the hacking, which they only recently discovered. US law enforcement agencies request access, through a warrant, to specific portions of that data as part of criminal and national security investigations. US officials have briefed the House and Senate intelligence committees on the Chinese hacking campaign, two sources said. The Chinese hacking team in question is known in the cybersecurity industry as Salt Typhoon. FBI Director Christopher Wray has said that Chinese government-backed hackers outnumber FBI cyber personnel 50 to 1.

Persons: Lumen, Liu Pengyu, Christopher Wray, Antony Blinken, Xi Jinping, Joe Biden Organizations: CNN, Verizon, Lumen, Justice Department, FBI, Embassy, ”, Street Journal, Microsoft, Google Locations: China, Washington, Beijing, Washington ,, Taiwan, California

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