U.S. advisory group urges Congress to probe Chinese cyber spying

PanARMENIAN.Net - The U.S. Congress should conduct an in-depth assessment of Chinese cyber spying and consider imposing tougher penalties on companies that benefit from industrial espionage, a federal advisory group said Wednesday, Nov 14, according to Reuters.

The recommendations by the bipartisan U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission reflect its stated concern that China has become "the most threatening actor in cyberspace."

In its annual report to Congress, the commission said the most notable trend in Chinese cyber-espionage over the past year had been "increasingly creative and resourceful targeting" across government, industry and civil society.

Among these are stepped-up efforts to defeat so-called two factor authentication, it said, referring to the use of a security token in addition to a traditional password.

Separately, Beijing appeared to be within two years of putting nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles on submarines as it continues to modernize and expand its nuclear stockpile, the report said, citing U.S. Defense Department estimates.

Congress should require the State Department to spell out steps to bring China into existing and future nuclear arms control efforts, the group said.

The report included 32 recommendations for congressional action on ties between the United States and China, the world's No. 1 and No. 2 economies.

The pair also are the top spenders on their militaries, although Washington spends about five times as much as Beijing, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks the figures.

The commission's report did not address U.S. espionage involving China, whose rise as a global competitor has helped frame a U.S. geo-strategic "pivot" toward the Pacific, announced a year ago after a decade of land wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The report was written before China's 18th Party Congress that will bring in a new generation of leaders. So the commission did not analyze the change in leadership, perhaps the most significant political event in China in a decade.

The commission said Congress should consider tougher screening laws for investments made by China's state-owned enterprises because of their allegedly unfairly subsidized challenges to U.S. corporate competitors.

The commission was set up by Congress in 2000 to study the national security implications of U.S.-China trade and economic relations after President Bill Clinton's administration granted China permanent trading status and approved its accession to the World Trade Organization.