China’s ‘ransom’ tantrum
China shot back at accusations by the United States and its allies that Beijing was behind a series of ransomware attacks and the hacking of Microsoft’s e-mail server this spring, dismissing the charge as “made up out of thin air” and claiming that the US “is the world champion of malicious cyber attacks.”
“The United States ganged up with its allies to make unwarranted accusations against Chinese cybersecurity,” China’s foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said Tuesday. “This was made up out of thin air and confused right and wrong. It is purely a smear and suppression with political motives.”
The White House on Monday said the FBI and the National Security Agency have “high confidence” that Beijing’s Ministry of State Security contracted with hackers who used vulnerabilities in the Microsoft Exchange Server to carry out the cyberattacks in April, as well as conducting a campaign of ransomware attacks against private companies “for their own personal profit.”
The US was joined by Britain, Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Canada, NATO and the European Union to expose China’s “malicious cyber activities,” the White House said in a statement.