Lawmakers Resist Blaming China For Federal Data Hack
The lawmakers won't point the finger at China just yet.
— -- Administration officials are still working to determine who is responsible for the massive data hack potentially involving millions of federal employees, Members of Congress briefed on the investigation said Tuesday night.
Members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence received a briefing Tuesday evening from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Department of Homeland Security and Office of Personnel Management.
Rep. Devin Nunes, the chairman of the committee, declined to point the finger directly at China, which has been widely floated as the prime suspect, emphasizing that the investigators are still searching for answers.
“We can't get into that at this point until the investigation because you don't want to go off with something that's not true,” Nunes, R-California, told reporters after the briefing. “I just think it's important for all of us to step back, let the investigation take place so we get the right information out to the public.”
Nunes also said that the administration is still working to determine the scope of the hack and exactly whose information may have been compromised.
“This is early on in the investigation, we've encouraged the administration and executive branch to get us as much information as possible as quickly as possible, so that the oversight committees are well informed as this investigation is ongoing,” Nunes said. “It's too soon to know exactly what was taken and whether or not that information can be accessed.”
Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said that officials are still working to determine what the motivation was behind the attack – whether it is economic- or intelligence-based – and what the impact might be in the long-term.
“This is a very serious breach and the repercussions are as yet undetermined,” Schiff, D-California, said. “They're still trying to ascertain the scope of the damage.”
Schiff said the scope of the hack “certainly goes back potentially decades” in terms of the information that was potentially accessed, but officials are still working to determine exactly which files may have been compromised.
“Even in terms of the scope of those 4 million [federal employees], access doesn't always mean compromise of that information,” Schiff said. “Generally an investigation of this kind you assume the worst so you assume the files were access, they've been compromised, and you have to act accordingly, you have to try to mitigate accordingly, but we're [going to] try to do everything possible to determine what the extent of the loss of actual information was.”
Schiff said the government continues to “make progress” in terms of attribution of the hack, but does not have a strong enough case to go public.
“We'll have to wait for the point where the administration feels comfortable making a public attribution. At this point, that's not something that we can do,” he said.
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