(Reuters) – Chinese hackers gained access to the networks of broadband providers in the United States and obtained information from systems used by the federal government for court-authorized wiretapping, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.
Verizon Communications (NYSE:), AT&T (NYSE:), and Lumen Technologies are among the telecommunications companies whose networks were compromised due to the recently discovered hack, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter.
The newspaper said that the hackers may have had access for several months to the network infrastructure used by companies to cooperate with court-authorized US requests for communications data. She added that the hackers were also able to access other segments of Internet traffic.
China’s Foreign Ministry responded on Sunday that it was not aware of the attack described in the report but said the United States had “concocted a false narrative” to entrap China in the past.
“At a time when cybersecurity has become a common challenge for all countries around the world, this wrong approach will only hinder the efforts of the international community to jointly confront the challenge through dialogue and cooperation,” the ministry said in a statement to Reuters.
Beijing has previously denied allegations by the US government and others that it used hackers to break into foreign computer systems.
Verizon, AT&T and Lumen Technologies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The newspaper said that the attack was carried out by a Chinese hacking group with the aim of gathering intelligence information. American investigators called it a “salt hurricane.”
Earlier this year, US law enforcement disabled a major Chinese hacking group dubbed “Flax Typhoon,” months after confronting Beijing over sweeping cyberespionage under a campaign called “Volt Typhoon.”
The Chinese Foreign Ministry said in its statement that Beijing’s cybersecurity agencies found and published evidence showing that Volt Typhoon was orchestrated by an “international ransomware organization.”