British trade minister Chris Bryant says the government was hacked in October, partly confirming a report in the Sun newspaper, which said a Chinese group breached systems to access foreign office data.
“There certainly has been a hack,” Bryant told Times Radio on Friday. “I’m not able to say whether it is directly related to Chinese operatives or, indeed, the Chinese state.”
The Sun named Storm 1849 as the Chinese cyber gang responsible for the breach, which it said was understood to possibly include tens of thousands of visa details.
Bryant said the reporting about the incident was “speculation” and the government was continuing to investigate, but at this stage it was “fairly confident” there was a low risk any individual would be affected.
“We managed to close the hole, as it were, very quickly,” Bryant told Sky News, describing the breach. “It was a technical issue in one of our sites.”
The Sun newspaper said the group, Storm 1849, was a China-linked gang which was part of a state-aligned hacking apparatus and which has been accused of targeting politicians and groups critical of the Chinese government.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said earlier in December China posed “national security threats” to Britain but defended his government’s decision to step up engagement with the country. He is due to visit Beijing in late January, according to sources.
The incident at the foreign office follows two major cyberattacks on big British companies this year. Hacks forced the country’s largest carmaker, Jaguar Land Rover, to shut down production for five weeks, while retailer Marks & Spencer suspended online orders for six weeks.
Asked for details of the incident, the foreign office said it had been working to investigate a cyber incident.
“We take the security of our systems and data extremely seriously,” a government spokesperson said.