Washington:
The US Treasury Department said on Monday that a Chinese state-sponsored actor was behind a cyber breach that resulted in access to some of its workstations, according to a letter to Congress seen by AFP.
The incident occurred earlier this month, when the actor compromised a third-party cybersecurity service provider and remotely accessed Treasury Department workstations and some unclassified documents, a Treasury spokesperson added.
The Treasury Department contacted the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency after being notified of the situation by its provider BeyondTrust, and has been working with law enforcement partners to determine the impact.
“The compromised BeyondTrust service has been taken offline and there is no evidence to indicate the threat actor continues to have access to Treasury systems or information,” the ministry spokesperson added.
In its letter to the leadership of the Senate Banking Committee, the Treasury Department said: “Based on available indicators, the incident has been attributed to a Chinese state-sponsored Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor.”
The department did not provide further details on the impact of the breach, but said more information will be released in a supplemental report at a later date.
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