Media conglomerate News Corp revealed Friday that it was the target of a cyberattack affecting a limited number of email accounts and documents” from its headquarters, and publications including Dow Jones, News UK, and New York Post.
“Our preliminary analysis indicates that foreign government involvement may be associated with this activity, and that some data was taken,” chief technology officer David Kline and chief information security officer Billy O’Brien wrote in an email to staff.
The publisher of the Wall Street Journal is being assisted in the investigation of the hack by cybersecurity firm Mandiant, which linked the attack to China.
“Mandiant assesses that those behind this activity have a China nexus, and we believe they are likely involved in espionage activities to collect intelligence to benefit China’s interests,” David Wong, vice president of consulting at Mandiant, said in a statement to CBS News.
News Corp noted that other business units, including HarperCollins Publishers, Move, News Corp Australia, Foxtel, REA, and Storyful, were not targeted as part of last month’s attack.
News Corp first shared the hack in a filing with the SEC on Friday. While the company disclosed in the filing that its initial investigation has revealed data was taken, it also said that “[t]o the Company’s knowledge, its systems housing customer and financial data were not affected.”
News Corp indicated that preliminary findings point to a supply chain hack, writing in its report that the organization discovered one of its third-party providers used to support its technology and “cloud-based” systems “was the target of persistent cyberattack activity,” last month.
The Wall Street Journal reported the news of the hack first.
