WASHINGTON (AP) — Chinese hackers targeted cellphones used by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, his running mate, JD Vance, and people associated with the Democratic campaign of Kamala Harris, people familiar with the matter said Friday. It was not immediately clear what data, if any, may have been accessed. U.
S. officials are continuing to investigate, according to the people, who were not authorized to publicly discuss the ongoing inquiry and spoke on the condition of anonymity to The Associated Press. An FBI statement did not confirm that Trump and Vance were among the potential targets but said it was investigating “unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by actors affiliated with the People’s Republic of China.
” “Agencies across the U.S. Government are collaborating to aggressively mitigate this threat and are coordinating with our industry partners to strengthen cyber defenses across the commercial communications sector,” the FBI said.
U.S. officials believe the campaigns were among numerous targets of a larger cyberespionage operation launched by China, the people said.
It was not immediately clear what information China may have hoped to glean, though Beijing has for years engaged in vast hacking campaigns aimed at collecting the private data of Americans and government workers, spying on technology and corporate secrets from major American companies and targeting U.S. infrastructure.
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