A former Verizon employee who fed information to Chinese security agents about his employer, Chinese hacking operations, and pro-democracy activists living in the U.S. was sentenced to four years in prison on Monday.
Ping Li, 59, pleaded guilty earlier this year to conspiring to act as an agent of China going back to at least 2012. His sentencing comes as the U.S. cybersecurity community reels from a Chinese hacking operation that U.S. Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, recently described as the “worst telecom hack in our nation’s history—by far.”
The operation, which compromised Verizon and other telecom giants, targeted politicians including Donald Trump and Kamala Harris and may have given the hacking group Salt Typhoon, which is linked to China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS), access to some victims’ call audio and text messages. The hack exploited security backdoors that the companies built into their systems to assist domestic law enforcement with wiretapping requests.
Li’s sentencing agreement doesn’t suggest that he was involved in the Salt Typhoon hack, but his case illustrates how China has sought to infiltrate major telecoms and use insiders to gather information about corporate operations and political opponents.
Li, who was born in China but moved to the U.S. 30 years ago and became a U.S. citizen 16 years ago, began working for agents of China’s MSS at least as early as 2012, according to his sentencing memorandum. He traveled to the country to meet with a former classmate and friend who worked for the MSS on multiple occasions and also shared information with them through a variety of online accounts.
Li shared information with MSS agents about different types of communications the U.S. government can electronically monitor, what Verizon branches in China were doing, and cybersecurity training material from another employer. He also provided the agents with names and identifying details about members of Falun Gong, a religious group banned in China, who were living in the U.S. according to his plea agreement.
When the FBI arrested Li in July, he initially claimed that the MSS agent and former friend had only requested advice about investing in the stock market, according to his plea agreement. But after being confronted with emails he had sent, he admitted to conducting research on behalf of China and transmitting internal cybersecurity materials from his employer that he knew he wasn’t allowed to share.
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