US indicts Chinese hackers on charges of targeting coronavirus vaccine data and defence secrets
- Li Xiaoyu and Dong Jiazhi were charged with 11 counts of conspiracy, identity theft and fraud
- Li and Dong’s alleged victims include the US Department of Energy and more than a dozen US defence contractors, pharmaceutical companies and software firms
The US government has indicted two Chinese nationals in connection with long-running cyber espionage operations that aimed to net information on Covid-19 vaccines, military weapons and human rights activists, in what is the second Justice Department indictment against individuals from China in recent days.
Li Xiaoyu, 34, and Dong Jiazhi, 33, were charged with 11 counts of conspiracy, identity theft and fraud related to operations carried out from China since 2009, some in conjunction with China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS), according to an indictment filed on July 7 with the US District Court for the Eastern District of Washington and unsealed on Tuesday.
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US indicts Chinese men for hacking related to coronavirus vaccine data and defence secrets
Li and Dong’s victims include the US Department of Energy and more than a dozen US defence contractors, pharmaceutical companies and software firms, according to the document, which did not identify any of the companies. Non-US companies named as the defendants’ victims include a South Korean shipbuilding and engineering firm, an Australian defence contractor and two German software ventures.
Responsible for intelligence gathering and conducting investigations on issues related to interaction between Chinese and foreign entities, the MSS is roughly equivalent to America’s National Security Agency (NSA) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
“China has now taken its place, alongside Russia, Iran and North Korea in that shameful club of nations that provide a safe haven for cyber criminals in exchange for those criminals being ‘on call’ to work for the benefit of the state, here to feed the Chinese Communist Party’s insatiable hunger for American and other non-Chinese companies’ hard-earned intellectual property, including Covid-19 research,” John Demers, the assistant attorney general for national security, said in a Justice Department announcement.