Nicholas Burns, other US officials fall prey to Chinese hackers; email accounts breached

Two highest-ranking officials of US State Department recently fell prey to a cyber attack that saw Chinese hackers infiltrating ir emails. According to Wall Street Journal, email accounts of US Ambassor to China Nicholas Burns and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Daniel Kritenbrink were accessed by unknown perpetrators. 

Details about cyber incursion remain unclear, as United States refused to shed light on it. “For security reasons, we will not be sharing ditional information on nature and scope of this cybersecurity incident at this time," a spokesperson for department told New York Post.

" Department continuously monitors and responds to activity of concern on our networks. Our investigation is ongoing, and we cannot provide furr details at this time," y ded. 

report comes after Kritenbrink visited Beijing with US State Secretary Antony Blinken last month. So far, it is uncertain if  Secretary of State's email was also infiltrated. Multiple reports also suggest that attack occurred oustide State Department, with Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo’s account also being targetted. 

China refutes hacking claims 

specifics of it were detailed by Microsoft via a blog post. In article, tech giant referred to culprit as a “China-based actor.” It alleged that hackers intruded accounts of about 25 organizations.  Commerce Department later mitted that Microsoft h informed it about intrusion and it “took immediate action to respond.”

However, all claims relating to hack were dismissed by China. In a statement to Sputnik, Chinese Embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu expressed that Beijing "firmly opposes and combats cyber attacks and cyber ft in all forms." "This position is consistent and clear. Given virtual nature of cyberspace and fact that re are all kinds of online actors who are difficult to trace, identifying source of cyber attacks is a complex technical issue," Pengyu ded.