U.S. arrests Chinese citizen for ‘Sakula’ cyberattacks
A summary of the top news in Chinese politics and current affairs for August 25, 2017. Part of the daily The China Project newsletter, a convenient package of China’s business, political, and cultural news delivered to your inbox for free. Subscribe here.
In 2015, U.S.-China relations were shaken by revelations that American government computers, as well as the systems of several private insurance companies, had been hacked in years prior dating back to 2012. The American government blamed Chinese hackers for the attacks, an accusation the Chinese government called “irresponsible and unscientific.”
Now, over two years since those revelations, the U.S. Justice Department has arrested a 36-year-old Chinese citizen, Yu Pingan, for “conspiring with two other Chinese nationals to hack the computer networks of three unnamed companies in the United States,” the New York Times reports (paywall). The Times notes that the arrest is “one of the first brought against a Chinese national since a 2015 agreement between President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping of China to refrain from computer-related theft of industrial trade secrets.”
The hacking tool that the Justice Department linked Yu to was known as “Sakula,” a program that the FBI says was used to obtain the personal information of 21.5 million U.S. government workers and even job applicants, CNN notes. While Yu was not arrested explicitly for the hacking of U.S. government assets, the Justice Department appears to have identified him as “among a small group of hackers using the malicious code” that was deployed against the U.S. government, the Times says.
It is the first high-profile indictment of a Chinese citizen by the U.S. since the 2014 indictment of five members of a Shanghai-based People’s Liberation Army unit. Those hackers were never turned over to the U.S. government; Yu Pingan was apprehended at the Los Angeles airport when he came stateside for a conference.
- Military
Chinese naval fleet stages live-fire drill in Indian Ocean / Xinhua
Drone swarms vs conventional arms: China’s military debate / FT (paywall) - Human rights
Germany says Chinese rights activist won’t get fair hearing / Reuters
One of China’s Feminist Five denied permission to leave China over 2015 detention / Radio Free Asia - 19th Party Congress
China’s confident ‘silver fox’ steps into diplomatic limelight / Reuters - South China Sea
China’s latest moves in the South China Sea have sparked fears of a new land grab / Quartz - Xinjiang
China official says Xinjiang’s Muslims are ‘happiest in world’ / Reuters
Railway to connect 75 pct Xinjiang counties by 2020 / China Daily
