Wang Dong, Cyber Espionage, Pennsylvania 2014

WASHINGTON—In a unprecedented move, a grand jury in the Western District of Pennsylvania has indicted five Chinese military hackers for computer hacking, economic espionage and other offenses directed at six American victims in the U.S. nuclear power, metals and solar products industries.

The indictment alleges that the defendants conspired to hack into American entities, to maintain unauthorized access to their computers and to steal information from those entities that would be useful to their competitors in China, including state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

The victims of this cyber espionage include Westinghouse Electric Co., U.S. subsidiaries of SolarWorld AG, United States Steel Corp., Allegheny Technologies Inc., the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union (USW) and Alcoa Inc.

The indictment alleges that the conspirators stole trade secrets and sensitive, internal communications that would provide a competitor, or an adversary in litigation, with insight into the strategy and vulnerabilities of the American entity.

This is a case alleging economic espionage by members of the Chinese military and represents the first ever charges against a state actor for this type of hacking, said U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

The defendants include Wang Dong, Sun Kailiang, Wen Xinyu, Huang Zhenyu, and Gu Chunhui, who were officers in Unit 61398 of the Third Department of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

“State actors engaged in cyber espionage for economic advantage are not immune from the law just because they hack under the shadow of their country’s flag,” said John Carlin, Assistant Attorney General for National Security.

The charges include thirty-one counts of computer hacking, economic espionage and other offenses.

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