US cyber spying confirmed

Report shows concrete proof of 'unscrupulous' snooping

A Chinese report on global surveillance by US intelligence agencies has confirmed the existence of their snooping activities directed against China, the latest strike back against Washington for slapping cyber espionage charges against five Chinese military officers.

The report was released Monday by the Internet Media Research Center, which is under the State Council Information Office.

"The revelations about PRISM and other programs demonstrate that the US has mounted the most wide-ranging, costly, long-term surveillance operation in the history of the Internet," the report said.

PRISM is a secret surveillance program of the US National Security Agency (NSA), details of which were revealed by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Citing documents from Snowden, media reports, including from the South China Morning Post and Der Spiegel, have said that US secret surveillance targeted the Chinese government and its leaders, Chinese companies, scientific research institutes, ordinary Net users, and a large number of cellphone users.

The report said an investigation carried out by various Chinese government departments over several months "confirmed the existence of snooping activities directed against China."

Chen Kai, secretary-general of China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, said the report provides concrete evidence of Washington's long-term, mass-scale and unscrupulous surveillance. "It has gone far beyond the scope of national security," he said.

Monday's report stressed that the seamless cooperation among the US intelligence agencies, government and the private sector, with their big-data processing capabilities, allows the surveillance to extend in scope and seemingly without limit.

"Based on these facts, it is absurd and hypocritical for the US to criticize other countries of cyber theft or surveillance," Chen said.

A raft of government measures, including banning the Windows 8 operating system from new government computers and strengthening security checks of important IT products and services, indicate increasing attention to cyber security, which will help China prevent other countries' espionage activities, he said.