(FreedomBeacon.com)- China Unicom, a state-owned company prohibited in the US for national security, provided internet connectivity to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. Documents suggest critical White House contacts during President Trump’s state visit to China and State Department conversations with the Biden White House may have been hacked.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) founded China Unicom in the early 1990s, and its top leaders are also CCP party committee members. China Unicom upgraded Wuhan’s State Department OpenNet communications network and internet service in 2019 and 2020. China Unicom utilized Caribbean mobile phone networks to spy on US mobile phone users while US officials tried to limit its reach.
The Federal Communications Commission banned China Unicom in 2022, while the U.S. State Department made 60 transactions with China Unicom between 2017 and 2023.
The Committee that evaluates foreign firms operating in the United States telecommunications services sector has recommended that the FCC reject an application from Pacific Light Cable Network to build a cable between Hong Kong and the United States.
The firm was targeted because of its “connections to PRC state-owned carrier China Unicom” and its “links with PRC intelligence and security agencies.” The State Department identified China Unicom as a potentially detrimental firm in an information brief dated December 8, 2020. On January 7, 2021, the NYSE delisted China Unicom. Biden modified Trump’s EO on January 14, 2021, but China Unicom’s access was still limited.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control updated its list of China Military-Industrial Complex Firms on December 16, 2021. The FCC canceled China Unicom’s US telecom license on January 27, 2022. The Executive Branch has assessed that China Unicom services pose a significant and unacceptable danger to US national security and its citizens. Nevertheless, on December 27, 2022, the State Department contracted with China Unicom for an OpenNet P2P circuit between Beijing and the White House. The 1979 American embassy in Moscow was built using Soviet labor and materials.
In 1985, electronic monitoring equipment was discovered in the nearly-built US embassy in Moscow, prompting calls to demolish it. The CIA created “The Moscow Rules” to survive in the Soviet capital during the Cold War.
Lessons should be learned. One should avoid having the CCP install your internet service.
