By Harriet Torry
BERLIN--The U.S. National Security Agency allegedly spied on
Chinese technology company Huawei Technologies Co. in early 2009
and targeted Chinese officials including former President Hu
Jintao, according to German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel.
The allegations were contained in pre-released extracts of an
article from next week's edition, citing documents leaked by former
NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
Aside from Mr. Hu, other NSA targets in China included the
Chinese Trade Ministry, the Foreign Ministry and unidentified
banks, Der Spiegel reported. In the extracts, Der Spiegel didn't
elaborate on the alleged spying on the officials.
Referring to a top-secret NSA presentation, the magazine said
the NSA accessed the Chinese network equipment supplier's email
archive, including Huawei Chief Executive Ren Zhengfei's
messages.
The NSA also accessed the secret source code for certain Huawei
products, the presentation reportedly said. The NSA's operations
against Huawei, called Shotgiant, were conducted with involvement
from the White House, the Central Intelligence Agency and the
Federal Bureau of Investigation, Der Spiegel added.
The White House on Saturday didn't immediately respond to a
request for comment on the Spiegel article. And Huawei couldn't
immediately be reached for comment.
The magazine quoted Huawei spokesman Bill Plummer as saying "If
such espionage has been truly conducted, then it is known that the
company is independent and has no unusual ties to any government
and that knowledge should be relayed publicly to put an end to an
era of mis- and disinformation."
Der Spiegel is one of a small number of international media
outlets that have reviewed documents they say have been leaked by
Mr. Snowden, and they have published articles on the revelations
since mid-2013.
The German news weekly said U.S. National Security Council
spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden declined to comment on specific
collection activities or about intelligence operations on specific
foreign countries, but told the magazine "We do not give
intelligence we collect to U.S. companies to enhance their
international competitiveness or increase their bottom line."
Der Spiegel quoted an internal NSA document as saying "We
currently have good access and so much data [about Huawei] that we
don't know what to do with it." A special unit of the U.S.
intelligence agency infiltrated Huawei's network and copied a list
of 1,400 customers and internal documents, the magazine says.
According to Der Spiegel, an NSA document said that since "many
of our targets communicate over Huawei-produced products, we want
to make sure that we know how to exploit these products."
Two years after the start of the alleged NSA spying, in 2011,
the U.S. excluded Huawei, which competes with Cisco Systems and
Juniper Networks, from taking part in the building of a U.S.
wireless network for emergency responders, citing national security
concerns.
Write to Harriet Torry at harriet.torry@wsj.com
Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires