House Republicans Seek Briefing on Chinese Cyber Tactics

The House Homeland Security Committee is seeking a briefing on Chinese state-sponsored malicious cybersecurity activity against American critical infrastructure networks, Chairman Mark Green, R-Tenn., said Thursday in a joint statement with House Cybersecurity Subcommittee Chairman Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, NSA and FBI released a joint cybersecurity advisory with agencies in Australia, New Zealand and the U.K. Wednesday. The advisory detailed how China has been using “legitimate network administration tools” to blend into local networks and “avoid identification by many endpoint detection and response (EDR) products, and limit the amount of activity that is captured in common logging configurations.” China’s goal is to steal intellectual property and sensitive data from organizations around the world, said CISA Director Jen Easterly. The House Homeland Security Committee is “extremely concerned” about the malicious activity, particularly activity in Guam, where there are heightened threats to the U.S. military, said Green and Garbarino: “We will request a briefing to better understand the scope of this activity and the resources needed to defend against any renewed threat. Congress must do everything it can to empower and equip CISA to support critical infrastructure owners and operators to defend their networks.”