As those all over the world welcomed 2025 with countdowns and cheers, the United States government welcomed 2025 with a supposed Chinese hacking into its federal treasury database.
“The Treasury letter earlier this week said hackers compromised third-party cybersecurity service provider BeyondTrust and accessed several employee workstations and unclassified documents,” The Guardian reported on January 1st. Additionally, it was stated that the hackers specifically “compromised the Office of Foreign Assets Control and the Office of Financial Research and also targeted the office of US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen,” The Guardian reported.
However, the reason for the breach still remains unclear. Many are left wondering if this breach was just a simple act of espionage or if there was an underlying motive behind the attack? Many sources have hypothesised that due to the U.S .Treasury Department overseeing sensitive data about the global financial system and market, the current fragility of the Chinese economy prompted the attack by the hackers. Moreover, the Treasury department has “implement[ed] sanctions against Chinese firms, including, in recent times, those aiding Russia in the war against Ukraine,” making this information extremely valuable to Chinese interests, reported Ana Swanson and David E. Sanger of The New York Times.
However, what should probably concern the American public more is that this isn’t the first breach the US has endured at the hands of Chinese manipulation. Earlier, throughout the month of December, nine of America’s major telecommunication firms were hacked. This breach enabled Beijing to gain access to texts and phone conversations involving key political and business figures including president-elect Trump and his incoming vice-president J.D. Vance. “The attack was blamed on a Chinese group dubbed Salt Typhoon (‘Typhoon’ being a moniker used to describe hackers sponsored by the Chinese government), and its extent and damage is still being assessed,” Ian Williams of The Spectator reported.
However, when Chinese officials were questioned about the December breaches and the breach that occurred a week ago, “Beijing angrily denied the accusations, which Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the foreign ministry, described as ‘groundless’. China ‘has always opposed all forms of hacker attacks’, she insisted,” Williams wrote.
These attacks are contributing to the already unstable relationship between China and the United States. The next few months seem ominous for both countries, however, these breaches should be a wake-up-call to the United States government. The need for better cyber security surrounding our federal administrations is becoming more and more present in our daily lives.
