China accuses US of cyberattack: Beijing says sensitive info stolen; what is National Time Center?
China's ministry of state security accused the US NSA of conducting cyberattacks on its National Time Service Center, exploiting mobile messaging vulnerabilities to steal sensitive data. The ministry stated these attacks, using specialised tools, targeted critical timing systems and warned of potential disruptions to network communications, financial systems, and power supply.
China accuses US of cyberattack: Beijing says sensitive info stolen; what is National Time Center? Representative image (AI) China on Sunday accused the US National Security Agency (NSA) of carrying out cyberattacks on its National Time Service Center. It further warned that any damage to the facility could disrupt network communications, financial systems and power supply.
The Ministry of State Security said in a WeChat post that the US agency exploited vulnerabilities in the messaging services of a foreign mobile phone brand in 2022 to steal sensitive information from devices used by the center’s staff. The ministry however, did not name the brand. It also claimed that the NSA used 42 types of “special cyberattack tools” to target multiple internal network systems and attempted to infiltrate a key timing system between 2023 and 2024, news agency Associated Press reported.