Chinese hackers breached US court wiretapping systems, WSJ reports from Reuters

(Reuters) – Chinese hackers accessed the networks of U.S. broadband providers and obtained information from systems the federal government uses for court-authorized wiretapping, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

Verizon Communications (NYSE: ), AT&T (NYSE: ) and Lumen Technologies are among the telecommunications companies whose networks were breached by the newly discovered intrusion, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Hackers may have had months of access to the network infrastructure used by the companies to cooperate with US court-authorized requests for communications data, the paper said. It said the hackers also accessed other tranches of Internet traffic.

China’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Beijing has in the past denied claims by the US government and others that it used hackers to break into foreign computer systems.

Verizon Communications, AT&T and Lumen Technologies did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Wall Street Journal said the attack was carried out by a Chinese hacking group with the aim of gathering information. US investigators called it the “Salt Typhoon”.

Earlier this year, US law enforcement disrupted a major Chinese hacking group nicknamed “Flax Typhoon”, months after confronting Beijing about widespread cyber espionage in a campaign dubbed “Volt Typhoon”.