FBI Director Warns of Vastly Outnumbered US Cyber Intelligence Staff in Face of Chinese Hackers

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FBI Director Warns of Vastly Outnumbered US Cyber Intelligence Staff in Face of Chinese Hackers

By CircleID Reporter
April 29, 2023, 7:32 am PDT Views: 6,105 Add Comment

FBI Director Christopher Wray testified on the president’s 2024 budget request for the agency before a House Appropriations subcommittee.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is facing a massive cybersecurity challenge as the U.S. is vastly outnumbered by Chinese hackers, according to FBI Director Christopher Wray. In testimony before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Thursday, Wray urged Congress to provide the FBI with more funds to bolster its cyber intelligence staff.

Wray said the number of Chinese hackers is at least 50 times greater than the current number of FBI cyber agents and analysts. “To give you a sense of what we’re up against, if each one of the FBI’s cyber agents and intel analysts focused exclusively on the China threat—on nothing but China—Chinese hackers would still outnumber FBI cyber personnel by at least 50 to 1,” Wray testified. This underscores the enormity of the cyber threats the U.S. is facing, especially from China, which Wray said is “a bigger hacking program than every other major nation combined”. Other countries like Russia, Iran, and North Korea are also posing significant risks to the U.S. cybersecurity, and the FBI is currently investigating over 100 ransomware variants with numerous victims for each.

To address this issue, the FBI is requesting $63 million to hire 192 additional cyber staff and put more cyber personnel in field offices. According to Wray, this will allow the FBI to be closer to victims of cyber crimes.

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By CircleID Reporter — CircleID’s internal staff reporting on news tips and developing stories. Do you have information the professional Internet community should be aware of? Contact us.
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