FBI raided a credit card office owned by Chinese company.
The Chinese company is one of the largest digital payment providers in the world with more than 60 million devices in use across 120 countries
US regulators have revoked the authorization for China Telecom’s American subsidiary to conduct business in the United States
The Federal Communications Commission has ordered China Telecom America to discontinue service within 60 days, ending a nearly 20-year operation in US
FCC cited ‘significant’ national security risks for CTA and the Chinese government to access, store, disrupt, and/or misroute US communications
FCC fear CTA continuing in the US would ‘allow them to engage in espionage and other harmful activities against the United States’
China Telecom is China’s largest fixed-line operator connecting customers to the internet
Action undoubtedly ratchets up tensions between the economic superpowers
PAX, a Chinese company is one of the largest digital payment providers in the world with more than 60 million devices in use across 120 countries
Federal investigators have raided the Florida offices of a Chinese credit card reader company that is believed to have been behind dozens of cyberattacks around the world.
PAX Technology that makes point-of-sale devices with more than 60 million in use across 120 countries and generated around $727 million in sales revenues in 2020.
The Jacksonville raid is believed to be tied to reports that the system PAX operates was used in cyberattacks on U.S. and European organizations.
Agents with the FBI and Department of Homeland Security raided a local PAX Technology warehouse.
‘FBI and MI5 are conducting an intensive investigation into PAX,’ a source told the station. ‘A major US payment processor began asking questions about network packets originating from PAX terminals and were not given any good answers.’
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The payment processing company’s terminals have been used both as malware ‘dropper’ for malicious file and also as a ‘command-and-control’ device in order to carry out attacks and collect information.
The FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and other agencies raided the offices of PAX, a Chinese point-of-sale manufacturer in Jacksonville
‘My sources say that there is tech proof of the way that the terminals were used in attack ops. The packet sizes don’t match the payment data they should be sending, nor does it correlate with telemetry these devices might display if they were updating their software. PAX is now claiming that the investigation is racially and politically motivated,’ according to KrebsOnSecurity.
Payment terminals and the software they use have long been the choice of cybercriminals
It is not known exactly what ‘strange network activity’ was detected that led to the investigation by the FBI.
The raid is part of the Biden administration’s extended efforts, many of which began under then-President Donald Trump to limit access to U.S. technology and markets for state-owned Chinese companies due to concern they were security risks or helping with military development.
The Chinese company is one of the largest digital payment providers in the world with more than 60 million devices in use across 120 countries
On Wednesday, U.S. regulators announced they are expelling a unit of China Telecom Ltd., one of the country’s three major state-owned carriers, from the American market, describing them as a national security threat amid rising tensions with Beijing.
China Telecom Americas Corp. is required to stop providing domestic interstate and international service in the United States within 60 days, under an order approved Tuesday by the Federal Communications Commission.
The FCC cited the danger that Beijing might use the company to eavesdrop or disrupt U.S. communications and ‘engage in espionage and other harmful activities against the United States.
The banning of China Telecom comes as the Pentagon’s top general said that China’s recent test of an earth-circling hypersonic missile was akin to the Soviet Union’s stunning launch of the world’s first satellite, Sputnik, in 1957, which sparked the superpowers’ space race.
US regulators have revoked the authorization for China Telecom’s American subsidiary to conduct business in the United States
Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed for the first time the Chinese test of a nuclear-capable missile that would be very difficult to defend against.
‘What we saw was a very significant event of a test of a hypersonic weapon system. And it is very concerning,’ Milley told Bloomberg TV.
‘I don’t know if it’s quite a Sputnik moment, but I think it’s very close to that,’ he said.
‘It’s a very significant technological event that occurred… and it has all of our attention.’
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted on Monday to revoke China Telecom’s license to operate in the US, citing ‘threats to national security’
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