U.S. hacking China telecom and Universities: Snowden - South China Morning Post

This will make the talks on computer espionage recently agreed to by presidents Barack Obama 奥巴马 and Xi Jinping 习近平 more interesting. - GWC

U.S. hacks Telecom, Chinese University systems, says Snowden - South China Morning Post

US spies are hacking into Chinese mobile phone companies to steal text messages and attacking the servers at Tsinghua University, Edward Snowden has told the Sunday Morning Post.

The latest explosive revelations about US National Security Agency cybersnooping in Hong Kong and on the mainland are based on further scrutiny and clarification of information Snowden provided on June 12.The former technician for the US Central Intelligence Agency and contractor for the National Security Agency provided documents revealing attacks on computers over a four-year period.The documents listed operational details of specific attacks on computers, including internet protocol (IP) addresses, dates of attacks and whether a computer was still being monitored remotely.The Sunday Morning Post can now reveal Snowden's claims that the NSA is:

• Extensive hacking of major telecommunication companies in China to access text messages

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• Sustained attacks on network backbones at Tsinghua University, China’s premier seat of learning

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• Hacking of computers at the Hong Kong headquarters of Pacnet, which owns one of the most extensive fibre optic submarine cable networks in the region

Pacnet, which recently signed major deals with the mainland's top mobile phone companies, owns more than 46,000 kilometres of fibre-optic cables. The cables connect its regional data centres across the Asia-Pacific region, including Hong Kong, the mainland, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan. It also has offices in the US.Snowden claims that data from Chinese mobile phone companies has been compromised, with millions of private text messages mined by the NSA.Cybersecurity experts on the mainland have long feared mobile phone companies had fallen victim to back-door attacks because they were forced to go overseas to buy core technology for their networks. In recent years, those security concerns became more vocal and as a result domestic network equipment suppliers such as Huawai, Datang and ZTE started to close the technology gap, enabling the phone companies to reduce their reliance on foreign suppliers.As for the attacks at Tsinghua University, the leaked information points to the NSA hacking into the institute's servers as recently as January.Tsinghua is widely regarded as China's top education and research institute and carries out extensive work on next-generation web technologies.It is home to one of the mainland's six major network backbones, the China Education and Research Network.