According to the department, the attack occurred at the beginning of December when a third-party provider of cybersecurity services was hacked. Via the provider, the hacker remotely controlled the department's computers and gained access to several workstations and documents.
"Based on available indicators, the incident has been attributed to a China state-sponsored APT actor (advanced persistent threat)", the department has previously written in a letter to the US Senate Banking Committee.
China denies the allegations and calls them "groundless".
Mao Ning, spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, says that Beijing "has always opposed all forms of cyberattacks, and we are even more opposed to the spread of false information about China for political purposes".
The current service from the cybersecurity firm Beyond Trust has been taken out of use. There is nothing to suggest that the hackers still have access to the finance department's systems, says a spokesperson for the department.
