(Molly Bruns, Headline USA) Cybersecurity firm Mandiant discovered that Chinese media company Haixun Press placed several articles promoting China on American news websites.
The organization distributed over 30 articles to outlets worldwide, including in at least 32 different news publications in the U.S., such as The Arizona Republic and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Daily Caller reported.
Mandiant investigated the depths of Haixun’s influence in the United States, and suspected that the organization possibly funded two protests in Washington D.C. in 2022.
Mandiant alleged that the Chinese organization followed up the protests with divisive news coverage. One article criticized the government’s decision to import all goods manufactured in Xinjiang, China due to the Chinese Communist Party’s forced labor of the Uyghur Muslims.
The article immediately followed a June 2022 protest advocating for greater use of solar panels. Xinjiang exported over half of the world’s solar panels.
The influence campaign, also called “HaiEnergy,” made use of social media along with a press release service called Times News Wire to post stories about the protest.
The Times News Wire hosted a press release criticizing former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, which The Arizona Republic re-published.
The article accused Pelosi of visiting the island for a “silly photo op,” and claimed “the Biden administration has enough problems at home and abroad that it doesn’t need to look for them in China and Taiwan.”
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette also used copy from the Times New Wire, most notably an article titled “The Frequent Shootings in the United States are the Greatest Contempt for Human Rights.”
Mandiant investigators suspected that the HaiEnergy campaign and the Times News Wire connected on various topics. there not enough evidence to confirm that they were directly linked.
Recent revelations of Chinese activity on the American continent indicated steps towards aggressive interference—including hacking into the emails of high-level State Department officials, including Chinese Ambassador Nicholas Burns and assistant secretary of state for East Asia, Daniel Kritenbrink.
