Critical U.S. infrastructure may face a higher risk of cyberattacks from the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
At a U.S. House hearing entitled “The Chinese Communist Party’s Cyber Threat to the American Homeland and National Security,” FBI Director Christopher Wray sounded an alarm that hackers linked with the PRC are targeting American infrastructure “to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm” to U.S. citizens and communities.
“Cyber threats to our critical infrastructure represent real-world threats to our physical safety,” Wray emphasized. Since 2013, the United States has identified the importance of ensuring the security and resilience of 16 critical infrastructure sectors that are essential to U.S. security, national economic security, and national public health or safety.
The communications, energy, transportation, and water sectors have already been the targets of a cyberattack by the PRC. Earlier in the day, the U.S. government shut down Volt Typhoon, a state-sponsored hacking group that created a botnet of hundreds of small office/home office network devices to conceal their activity as they targeted critical infrastructure organizations. But the threat of other PRC state-sponsored cyberattacks on U.S. critical infrastructure remains.
“Today, and literally every day, they’re actively attacking our economic security—engaging in wholesale theft of our innovation and our personal and corporate data,” Wray stressed.
