Two Chinese Nationals Indicted By The US Govt. On Charges Of Hacking COVID-19 Vaccine Date And Defense 

Two Chinese nationals, Li Xiaoyu, 34, and Dong Jiazhi, 33, have been apprehended by the U.S. government on hacking information for espionage operations. They have been charged on 11 counts of conspiracy that included identity theft and netting information on COVID-19 vaccines by the Justice Department.

They have also been held liable for committing fraud related to operations carried out from China since 2009, as mentioned in the indictment filed on July 7 with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Washington. They have committed fraud against the U.S. Department of Energy, dozens of U.S. defence contractors, pharmaceutical companies and software firms as well as a South Korean shipbuilding and engineering firm, an Australian defence contractor and two German software ventures.

The two Chinese nationals recently hacked “vulnerabilities in the networks of biotech and other firms publicly known for work on Covid-19 vaccines, treatments, and testing technology,” the indictment said.

“China has now taken its place, alongside Russia, Iran and North Korea in that shameful club of nations that provide a safe haven for cybercriminals in exchange for those criminals being ‘on-call’ to work for the benefit of the state, here to feed the Chinese Communist Party’s insatiable hunger for American and other non-Chinese companies’ hard-earned intellectual property, including Covid-19 research,” said John Demers, the assistant attorney general for national security.

They have also been stealing military data, which includes important information about satellite programmes, high powered microwave and laser systems, wireless networks and communications systems, a counter-chemical weapons system, and ship-to-helicopter integration systems. They have also been providing China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS) information about dissidents of interest to Beijing.

“They provided the MSS with email accounts and passwords belonging to a Hong Kong community organiser, the pastor of a Christian church in Xi’an and a dissident and former Tiananmen Square protester,” the court document said.

But the Chinese government has refuted all the allegations, claiming them to have no logical ground.

“Some US politicians seem to be alleging that China is waging cyberattacks to steal U.S. research on COVID-19 vaccines,” said foreign ministry spokeswoman, Hua Chunying. “It’s just absurd. We are already leading the world in vaccine R&D with top researchers. We don't need to secure an edge by theft. As we speak, Chinese research teams are moving ahead with multiple vaccine tasks through five technical routes.”