Czech Republic accuses China of ‘malicious cyber campaign’ against its foreign ministry

PRAGUE AP The Czech Republic has accused China of being responsible for cyberattacks against a a communication setup of its Foreign Ministry officers explained on Wednesday The Foreign Ministry in Prague reported the malicious exercises started in and targeted the country s critical infrastructure adding it supposed the Advanced Persistent Threat or APT hacking group which is associated with the Chinese Ministry of State Guard was behind the campaign It was not this instant clear what specific information were seized or what damage was caused by the attacks The Czech ministry declared a new communication system has already been put in place Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsk announced in a separate report that his ministry summoned China s ambassador to Prague to make it clear to Beijing that such initiatives have serious impacts on mutual relations The governing body of the Czech Republic strongly condemns this malicious cyber campaign against its critical infrastructure the declaration announced Such behavior undermines the credibility of the People s Republic of China and contradicts its populace declarations The Chinese Embassy dismissed the Czech accusations as groundless It reported China fights all forms of cyber attacks and does not aid promote or tolerate hacker attacks The United States denounced the Chinese programs and called on China to stop it without delay the U S Embassy in Prague announced in a report It stated ATP previously targeted U S and foreign politicians foreign agenda experts and others APT has also stolen agreement secrets and intellectual property and targeted entities in specific of America s the greater part vital critical infrastructure sectors including the Defense Industrial Base information mechanism and resource sectors the embassy commented NATO and the European Union also condemned the attack and expressed solidarity with the Czechs We observe with increasing concern the growing pattern of malicious cyber initiatives stemming from the People s Republic of China NATO commented This attack is an unacceptable breach of international norms Kaja Kallas the EU s foreign initiative chief revealed The EU will not tolerate hostile cyber actions In a separated cyberattack in the email account of then Czech Foreign Minister Lubom r Zaor lek and the accounts of dozens of ministry bureaucrats were successfully hacked Authorities explained the attack was sophisticated and experts inferred it was done by a foreign state which was not named then Sam McNeil contributed to this review from Paris Source