\n<\/p>\n
ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they\u2019re published.<\/p>\n
Microsoft says it has stopped using China-based engineers to support Defense Department cloud computing systems after ProPublica revealed the practice in an investigation this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn response to concerns raised earlier this week about US-supervised foreign engineers, Microsoft has made changes to our support for US Government customers to assure that no China-based engineering teams are providing technical assistance for DoD Government cloud and related services,\u201d the company\u2019s chief communications officer, Frank Shaw, announced on X Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n
Microsoft\u2019s announcement came hours after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said his agency would look into Microsoft\u2019s use of foreign-based engineers to help maintain the highly sensitive cloud systems.<\/p>\n
\u201cForeign engineers \u2014 from any country, including of course China \u2014 should NEVER be allowed to maintain or access DoD systems,\u201d Hegseth wrote in a post on X Friday.<\/p>\n
In its investigation, ProPublica detailed how Microsoft uses engineers in China to help maintain the Defense Department\u2019s computer systems \u2014 with minimal supervision by U.S. personnel \u2014 leaving some of the nation\u2019s most sensitive data vulnerable to hacking or spying from its leading cyber adversary. The arrangement, which was critical to Microsoft winning the federal government\u2019s cloud computing business a decade ago, relies on U.S. citizens with security clearances to oversee the work and serve as a barrier against espionage and sabotage.<\/p>\n
But these workers, known as \u201cdigital escorts,\u201d often lack the technical expertise to police the work of foreign engineers with far more advanced skills, ProPublica found.<\/p>\n
Earlier Friday, Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, chair of the Select Committee on Intelligence, cited ProPublica in a letter to Hegseth asking for details about which DOD contractors use Chinese personnel to maintain the department\u2019s information and computing systems.<\/p>\n
China poses \u201cone of the most aggressive and dangerous threats to the United States, as evidenced by its infiltrations of our critical infrastructure, telecommunications networks and supply chains,\u201d Cotton wrote in the letter, which he posted on X. \u201cDOD must guard against all potential threats within its supply chain, including those from subcontractors.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since 2011, cloud computing companies like Microsoft that wanted to sell their services to the U.S. government had to establish how they would ensure that personnel working with federal data would have the requisite \u201caccess authorizations\u201d and background screenings. Additionally, the Defense Department requires that people handling sensitive data be U.S. citizens or permanent residents.<\/p>\n
This presented an issue for Microsoft, which relies on a vast global workforce with significant operations in India, China and the European Union.<\/p>\n
So the tech giant enlisted staffing companies to hire U.S.-based digital escorts, who had security clearances that authorized them to access sensitive information, to take direction from the overseas experts. An engineer might briefly describe the job to be completed \u2014 for instance, updating a firewall, installing an update to fix a bug or reviewing logs to troubleshoot a problem. Then, with little review, an escort would copy and paste the engineer\u2019s commands into the federal cloud.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re trusting that what they\u2019re doing isn\u2019t malicious, but we really can\u2019t tell,\u201d one escort told ProPublica.<\/p>\n
In an earlier statement in response to ProPublica\u2019s investigation, Microsoft said that its personnel and contractors operate in a manner \u201cconsistent with US Government requirements and processes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The company\u2019s global workers \u201chave no direct access to customer data or customer systems,\u201d the statement said. Escorts \u201cwith the appropriate clearances and training provide direct support. These personnel are provided specific training on protecting sensitive data, preventing harm, and use of the specific commands\/controls within the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition, Microsoft said it has an internal review process known as \u201cLockbox\u201d to \u201cmake sure the request is deemed safe or has any cause for concern.\u201d<\/p>\n
Insight Global \u2014 a contractor that provides digital escorts to Microsoft \u2014 said it \u201cevaluates the technical capabilities of each resource throughout the interview process to ensure they possess the technical skills required\u201d for the job and provides training.<\/p>\n
\n A Little-Known Microsoft Program Could Expose the Defense Department to Chinese Hackers<\/strong>\n <\/p>\n Doris Burke contributed research.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they\u2019re published. Microsoft says it has stopped using China-based engineers to support Defense Department cloud computing systems after ProPublica revealed the practice in an investigation this week. \u201cIn response to concerns raised earlier this week<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11375,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[4728,2071,4085,4730,4729,1563,247,3733,2263],"class_list":{"0":"post-11374","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-social-issues","8":"tag-chinabased","9":"tag-company","10":"tag-computer","11":"tag-dod","12":"tag-engineers","13":"tag-microsoft","14":"tag-propublica","15":"tag-stops","16":"tag-systems"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}