By The Epoch Times | Created at 2026-08-06 00:36:44 | Updated at 2026-08-06 03:51:35
3 hours ago
Three Chinese state-owned telecommunications carriers kept equipment, data center cages, and live network connections across the United States years after federal regulators denied or revoked their authority to provide certain services, a bipartisan House investigation found.
China Telecom Americas, China Unicom Americas, and China Mobile International (USA) remained operationally tied to parent companies in China and Hong Kong through shared network systems, technical support, and personnel arrangements, according to the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party’s “Stranger Pings” report, released Aug. 4.
China Unicom Americas also embedded a mandatory acceptable use policy in intellectual property (IP) transit agreements with U.S. companies, according to the report. The reproduced policy prohibited political news violating Chinese laws, information violating Chinese state security laws, and content the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) claimed threatened “social order and social stability.”
The policy required customers to follow regulatory requirements imposed by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and Ministry of Public Security. The committee characterized the provisions as an attempt to extend the Chinese regime’s information controls to U.S. customers through private contracts.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) denied China Mobile International (USA) Inc.’s application in 2019. It revoked China Telecom Americas’ authority in 2021, and China Unicom Americas’ authority in 2022, citing national security and law enforcement risks.
These actions prevented the carriers from providing telecommunications services requiring Section 214 authority under the Communications Act. However, they did not require the companies to remove equipment, terminate data center arrangements or sever private network connections, leaving infrastructure outside the licensing regime in place, according to the report.
Residual Equipment and Network Access
China Telecom Americas identified 10 active points of presence across seven U.S. metropolitan areas in records produced to the committee in 2025. A point of presence is a physical location—often a rack or cage inside a data center—where a carrier maintains equipment and connects with other networks.
About 25 percent of the transmission equipment on China Telecom Americas’ U.S. network was manufactured by Huawei, according to testimony cited in the report. The FCC has designated Huawei a national security threat.
China Unicom Americas documented active colocation cages, power allocations, and live network connections in 11 U.S. cities, including Ashburn, Virginia; San Jose, California; Chicago; Dallas; Los Angeles; Miami; New York City; and Seattle.
China Mobile’s records identified 39 U.S. points of presence across 27 data center and interconnection facilities. The listed connections had a combined capacity of up to 1.38 terabits per second, the report said.
China Unicom Americas disclosed in response to a committee subpoena that seven of its eight directors and two of its three senior managers were CCP members.
A company witness also confirmed that China Unicom Global, its Hong Kong parent, appeared on an allow-list applied to the U.S. subsidiary’s border routers. The committee cited the configuration as further evidence of continued integration between the two networks.
108,000 Routing Observations
The committee said its analysis identified 108,891 Border Gateway Protocol routing events that it rated high confidence from January 2018 through May 2025.
In those events, networks linked to carriers in China or Hong Kong announced that they could route traffic intended for internet addresses assigned to U.S. networks. The committee rated an event high confidence when it found no evidence that the U.S. network had authorized the arrangement.
The observations involved address space associated with at least 477 U.S. networks, including telecommunications providers, Fortune 500 companies, and critical infrastructure operators.
Each event represented a routing observation—not a separate cyberattack, affected organization, or successful theft of data. The committee said some could have resulted from configuration errors, poor management, or aggressive routing practices rather than deliberate espionage.
Border Gateway Protocol, or BGP, is the system networks use to announce which internet addresses they can deliver traffic to. An improper announcement can cause traffic to pass through the wrong network.
In a separate analysis, the committee examined BGP activity involving China Telecom Americas and Chinese cybersecurity company Qihoo 360, whose networks had a direct peering relationship.
The volume of announcements from the two networks rose and fell in a statistically significant pattern from Sept. 22, 2024, through Sept. 25, 2024, according to the report. The four-day period immediately preceded the first public report of the Salt Typhoon intrusion into U.S. telecommunications networks on Sept. 26, 2024.
Salt Typhoon Investigation
The committee launched its investigation following the Salt Typhoon intrusions.
The report said China Mobile International’s network appeared in active routing paths to 58 internet addresses linked to Salt Typhoon attacker servers at least 192 times during that four-day period through Sept. 25, 2024. The committee said the data did not establish that China Mobile personnel knew of or participated in the cyber operation.
In November 2024, the FBI and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said Chinese regime-affiliated hackers had compromised networks at multiple telecommunications companies.
The agencies said the hackers stole customer call record data, compromised the private communications of a limited number of people primarily involved in government or political activity, and copied certain information sought by U.S. law enforcement under court orders.
The committee recommended that Congress authorize federal agencies to identify, restrict, mitigate and, when necessary, remove network infrastructure linked to foreign adversaries that remains after a license denial or revocation.
It also called for closer federal review of private colocation, IP transit, peering and remote network arrangements; a targeted “rip-and-replace” program designed to remove and replace insecure telecommunications equipment supplied by foreign adversaries; stronger routing security enforcement; and mandatory logging while suspect infrastructure awaits removal or mitigation.
