China offers bounty on hackers linked to Taiwan
BEIJING: Authorities in southern China have offered an undisclosed bounty for more than 20 people they say are linked to Taiwan and suspected of cyber attacks in China, the official news agency Xinhua said on Thursday, accusations Taipei strongly rejected.
The public security bureau in the Chinese city of Guangzhou said the hackers were connected to the Taiwan government and published their pictures, names and Taiwan identity card numbers.
Chinese authorities accused Taiwan of organising, planning and premeditating attacks on key sectors such as military, aerospace, government departments, energy and transportation, maritime affairs, science and technology research firms in China as well as in special administration regions Hong Kong and Macau, Xinhua said.
Xinhua, citing a cybersecurity report, said the Taiwan "information, communication and digital army" had cooperated with US anti-Chinese forces to conduct public opinion and cognitive warfare against China, secretly instigate revolution and attempt to disrupt public order in China.
Taiwan's defence ministry said in a statement it was not carrying out any "corporate cyber attacks", and that China's offers of a bounty highlighted "the rude and unreasonable attitude of the Chinese communists in intimidating and coercing the Taiwanese people."
"Recent statements by the European Union, the United States and the Czech Republic condemning the Chinese communists' hacking organisations for carrying out cyber-attacks prove that the Chinese communists are not only a regional troublemaker, but a common threat to the global internet," it added.
A senior Taiwan security official told Reuters that the Chinese allegations were invented, saying Beijing was trying to shift the focus from Czech and European scrutiny over alleged Chinese hacking activities there.
"They fabricated a false narrative to shift the focus. It's a very typical behaviour by the Chinese Communist Party," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the matter.
China also said Taiwan had longstanding cooperation with the US National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency and other intelligence agencies as part of the United States' "Asia-Pacific Strategy", calling it Taiwan's attempt to gain independence through relying on the United States.
"The US intelligence department has long provided personnel training and technical equipment support for Taiwan's 'information, communication and digital army', and many police stations have sent 'hunting' teams to Taiwan, to launch a cyber attacks on China," according to a social media post by an account linked to Chinese state television.
Last week authorities in Guangzhou, the capital of southern Guangdong province, attributed a cyber attack on an unnamed technology company to the Taiwan government, saying Taiwan's ruling Democratic Progressive Party supported the "overseas hacker organisation" responsible.
In response, Taiwan said Beijing was peddling false information, and that it was China that was carrying out hacking against the island.
China views Taiwan as its own territory. Taiwan's democratically elected government rejects Beijing's sovereignty claims.
Chinese courts and legal bodies have no jurisdiction in Taiwan, whose government has repeatedly complained about Beijing's "long armed jurisdiction" efforts.
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