Bacon said that he would “work overtime” to guarantee that Taiwan receives the entire billions of {dollars} in U.S. weaponry that it has ordered.
“I’m a big proponent for Taiwan,” Bacon informed The Washington Put up by textual content message. “I suspect they’d like info to embarrass me or to undercut me politically. As I told FBI, I have nothing to be embarrassed about.”
Authorities and personal sources informed The Put up a month in the past that victims of the hacking marketing campaign included Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, unnamed State Division workers, a human rights advocate and suppose tanks.
Additionally they mentioned {that a} congressional staffer had been focused.
Bacon informed The Put up he was notified of the hacking solely Monday, which means that new victims are nonetheless being found. The FBI didn’t reply to requests for remark. Neither did Microsoft.
Officers have described the spying as conventional espionage of the type anticipated by all sides. It was about commentary on problems with particular concern, such because the U.S. response to escalating tensions between the autonomous island of Taiwan and China, which claims it.
However the breach has alarmed consultants for an additional cause: It was unclear how the federal government might have prevented it whereas relying solely on Microsoft for cloud, e-mail and authentication companies.
Microsoft has mentioned that the hackers obtained highly effective signing keys they wanted to create verified buyer identities that would sidestep multifactor authentication. Mixed with different Microsoft failings, tens of millions of individuals might have been uncovered to assault.
Officers have mentioned that solely a pair dozen entities have been impersonated earlier than the State Division discovered suspicious conduct in its exercise logs. Microsoft was then in a position to search its personal logs for the grasp key that the hackers had obtained and block future entry.
A number of members of Congress have demanded that federal companies clarify how they plan to fight comparable assaults sooner or later and that Microsoft make logs extra extensively accessible, which it agreed to do.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) has gone additional, asking the Justice Division and Federal Commerce Fee to analyze whether or not Microsoft’s safety practices have been so poor as to be in violation of legal guidelines or its 20-year-old FTC consent decree requiring higher safety after the breach of what was then its single sign-on device for authentication, Passport.
Wyden additionally urged the Division of Homeland Safety to have its two-year-old Cyber Security Evaluate Board study the Microsoft cloud breach. Final week, the board mentioned it might take up the duty.
The Division of Homeland Safety referred inquiries to the FBI.
Leigh Ann Caldwell and David DiMolfetta contributed to this report.
