US breaches Internet trust

Washington has committed a series of mistakes and jeopardized cybersecurity by leveling charges against five PLA officers

By charging five People's Liberation Army officers with cyber crime, the US Department of Justice has cast a shadow on Sino-US cyber cooperation. The negative impact of the US move will have a long-term impact on Sino-US ties, because it has set a dangerous precedent in the international cybersecurity arena.

Besides, it is difficult for the US to achieve the result it so desperately desires because it has committed a series of mistakes. The first US mistake is the timing of the move, which inadvertently has revealed its true intentions. The US has been widely criticized for its clandestine mass electronic surveillance project, called PRISM, ever since it was exposed by former National Security Agency operative Edward Snowden in June 2013. But that has not stopped the US government from spying on other countries and their enterprises, for just three months ago the American media reported that the NSA had hacked the servers of China's Huawei. Since the US Department of Justice leveled the charge against the PLA officers shortly after that, it seems the US administration is trying to divert attention from the fallout of the PRISM project.