CNN reports that the U.S. Department of Justice has been working to extradite Chinese national Xu Zewei who has been accused of breaching U.S. institutions conducting COVID-19 research during the peak of the pandemic at the behest of China's Ministry of State Security following his arrest by Italian authorities last week.
Such a development has been welcomed by the University of Texas Medical Branch, which was among the entities purportedly compromised by Xu and other hackers part of his operation. Meanwhile, former State Department senior cyber official Teddy Nemeroff noted the arrest and subsequent extradition efforts to emphasize the U.S.'s thorough crackdown on threat actors. "Even five years after they targeted COVID vaccine research, U.S. law enforcement caught up with him. Such arrests are only possible with cooperation from strong law enforcement partners like Italy, who are willing to put themselves in potentially uncomfortable diplomatic positions with countries like China," said former State Department senior cyber official Teddy Nemeroff.
Such a development has been welcomed by the University of Texas Medical Branch, which was among the entities purportedly compromised by Xu and other hackers part of his operation. Meanwhile, former State Department senior cyber official Teddy Nemeroff noted the arrest and subsequent extradition efforts to emphasize the U.S.'s thorough crackdown on threat actors. "Even five years after they targeted COVID vaccine research, U.S. law enforcement caught up with him. Such arrests are only possible with cooperation from strong law enforcement partners like Italy, who are willing to put themselves in potentially uncomfortable diplomatic positions with countries like China," said former State Department senior cyber official Teddy Nemeroff.
