By Christopher Bing and Raphael Satter
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Nebraska Republican Congressman Don Bacon said late on Monday the FBI had warned him that his emails were hacked by Chinese spies, with both personal and campaign messages compromised.
Bacon was told that the Chinese Communist Party had access to his accounts for about a month ending on June 16, he said on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
The hack was the result of a “vulnerability in Microsoft software”, he said, an apparent reference to the hacking campaign that Microsoft disclosed last month, which reportedly resulted in the theft of hundreds of thousands of emails from senior U.S. officials, including U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns.
CNN previously reported that email accounts in the House of Representatives were targeted as part of the same campaign.
“There were other victims in this cyber operation,” Bacon said on X. “The Communist government in China are not our friends and are very active in conducting cyber espionage.”
The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. The FBI and Microsoft did not immediately reply.
Bacon, who was elected to Congress in 2016, is a former Air Force brigadier general who currently serves on the House Armed Services Committee, which helps decide the U.S. military’s annual budget and spending plans.
(Reporting by Christopher Bing and Raphael Satter; Editing by Devika Syamnath)
