FBI extradites Chinese hacker accused of stealing COVID-19 research

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A Chinese hacker accused of stealing COVID-19 research from U.S. institutions in a massive cyberattack has been extradited to American soil.

FBI Director Kash Patel said the case involving Xu Zewei is a “historic win for our cybersecurity efforts under President Trump, bringing bad actors who target American infrastructure to justice no matter where they try to hide.”

Patel said Xu, a Chinese national and accused state-sponsored hacker, is “allegedly responsible for a massive cyber intrusion campaign in 2020 and 2021 stealing COVID-19 research from American institutions.”

“Xu has been extradited to the U.S. out of Italy as of this weekend, and he will now face federal charges,” Patel revealed Tuesday in a post on X.

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“During 2020 and 2021, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Xu and his co-conspirators allegedly targeted and hacked U.S. based universities, immunologists, and virologists conducting COVID-19 research – including key treatment and vaccines – accessing email accounts and more,” Patel said.

The Justice Department said Xu is facing nine charges, including two counts of wire fraud, two counts of obtaining information by unauthorized access to protected computers and aggravated identity theft. The wire fraud charges carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for each count.

“According to court documents, officers of the PRC’s Ministry of State Security’s (MSS) Shanghai State Security Bureau (SSSB) directed Xu to conduct this hacking. The MSS and SSSB are PRC intelligence services responsible for PRC’s domestic counterintelligence, non-military foreign intelligence, and aspects of the PRC’s political and domestic security,” the Justice Department said.

“Xu and others reported their activities to officers in the SSSB who were supervising and directing the hacking activities,” the Justice Department added. “For example, on or about Feb. 19, 2020, Xu provided an SSSB officer with confirmation that he had compromised the network of a research university located in the Southern District of Texas. On or about Feb. 22, 2020, the SSSB officer directed Xu to target and access specific email accounts (mailboxes) belonging to virologists and immunologists engaged in COVID-19 research for the university. Xu later confirmed for the SSSB officer that he acquired the contents of the researchers’ mailboxes.”

FBI Director Kash Patel speaking at a news conference at the Justice Department

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Patel said, “Xu was also allegedly a key contractor [in] part of what’s known as HAFNIUM, a group responsible for a massive cyber intrusion campaign (directed by PRC officials) that compromised nearly 13,000 U.S. organizations.”

Patel thanked the FBI’s partners in Italy, mentioning that Prefect Vittorio Pisani of the Italian National Police “worked with us nonstop” in the investigation to bring Xu into custody.