Ex-CIA chief downplays claims of China ‘cyberwar’

Source: Joseph Menn, Financial Times.

Retired CIA chief Michael Hayden on Thursday added his voice to an effort by the Obama administration and its allies to tamp down talk of a “cyberwar” with China.

Mr Hayden’s speech on the topic at a major technology security conference followed similar remarks by White House cyber security co-ordinator Howard Schmidt, who has also taken issue with congressional testimony earlier in the year from former intelligence officials who said the US was at war and losing the fight.

Mr Hayden, who stepped down from the last of a long series of intelligence leadership jobs last year, acknowledged that China was a formidable force in the contest for superiority on the internet.

“As an intelligence professional, I stand back in absolute awe and wonder,” he said of the Chinese campaign to wrest industrial and defence secrets from major Western companies. “It is magnificent in its depth, its breadth and its persistence.”