Beijing:
China on Monday mentioned tweets by President Donald Trump suggesting Beijing was involved in a enormous cyberattack on the US government have been “a farce” concocted for political motives.
A huge-scale hack of US government agencies which includes the Treasury was “under control” as of Saturday, according to the outgoing US President.
But in a tweet thread he undercut his personal administration’s assessment that Russia was behind the cyberattack, as an alternative saying China “may” also have been involved, without having delivering any proof.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin stopped quick of straight denying Beijing’s involvement, but named US accusations of cyberattacks “not serious, and self-contradictory.”
“The accusations made by the US against China have always been a farce, out of political motives,” Wang told a press briefing.
“The US has politicised cybersecurity issues, continuously spread false information without conclusive evidence… in an attempt to destroy China’s image and mislead the international community,” he added.
In July, two Chinese nationals have been indicted by the US for looking for to steal coronavirus vaccine analysis and hacking hundreds of corporations — prompting Beijing to accuse Washington of “slander”.
Trump’s tweets on Saturday contradicted comments just a day earlier from his Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about the supply and the severity of the cyberattack, leaving administration spokespeople scrambling to reconcile the conflicting requires.
Pompeo earlier mentioned the breach was “pretty clearly” Russia’s work, adding there had been a considerable work to use third-celebration computer software to “essentially embed code inside of US government systems”.
Cyber authorities mentioned the attack could have far-reaching effect and take months to unravel.
Several US officials had previously pointed the finger at Moscow, but none at Beijing.
Russia has denied involvement in the newest attack.
Trump as president has often played down apparent threats from Russia — which includes his refusal to recognise interference by Moscow in the 2016 election regardless of the findings of US intelligence agencies.
(This story has not been edited by TheSpuzz employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)