Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Wednesday that he was putting an end to a program that had for nearly ten years allowed Chinese coders access to Department of Defense cloud systems.
Hegseth shared a video in which he described the “Digital Escorts” program — implemented under former President Barack Obama — under which Microsoft employed Chinese coders to “support sensitive DOD cloud systems” under the supervision of American contractors.
WATCH:
“Last month the Department of Defense was made aware of an Obama-Biden era legacy program called Digital Escorts,” Hegseth began. “For nearly a decade, Microsoft has used Chinese coders, remotely supervised by U.S. contractors, to support sensitive DOD cloud systems. The program was designed to comply with contracting rules but it exposed the department to unacceptable risk.”
“I mean, if you’re thinking ‘America First,’ and common sense, this doesn’t pass either of those tests,” Hegseth continued. “So I initiated an immediate review of this vulnerability and I want to report our initial findings.”
Hegseth went on to explain that his review had determined that any benefits were not worth the potential risk of allowing Chinese nationals to have that kind of access to sensitive information, especially information pertaining to Defense Department.
“The use of Chinese Nationals to service Department of Defense cloud environments? It’s over,” he declared. “We’ve issued a formal letter of concern to Microsoft documenting this breach of trust, and we’re requiring a third party audit of Microsoft’s Digital Escort program — including the code and the submissions by Chinese nationals.”
Hegseth also announced a separate investigation into the program and into all of the Chinese nationals who had been part of it: “Did they put anything in the code that we didn’t know about? We’re going to find out.”
“It blows my mind that I’m even saying these things, it’s such common sense,” Hegseth said as he once again reiterated his intent to remove all Chinese employees from access to DOD information. “We expect vendors doing business with the Department of Defense to put U.S. national security ahead of profit maximization … This never should have happened in the first place.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Wednesday that he was putting an end to a program that had for nearly ten years allowed Chinese coders access to Department of Defense cloud systems.
Hegseth shared a video in which he described the “Digital Escorts” program — implemented under former President Barack Obama — under which Microsoft employed Chinese coders to “support sensitive DOD cloud systems” under the supervision of American contractors.
WATCH:
“Last month the Department of Defense was made aware of an Obama-Biden era legacy program called Digital Escorts,” Hegseth began. “For nearly a decade, Microsoft has used Chinese coders, remotely supervised by U.S. contractors, to support sensitive DOD cloud systems. The program was designed to comply with contracting rules but it exposed the department to unacceptable risk.”
“I mean, if you’re thinking ‘America First,’ and common sense, this doesn’t pass either of those tests,” Hegseth continued. “So I initiated an immediate review of this vulnerability and I want to report our initial findings.”
Hegseth went on to explain that his review had determined that any benefits were not worth the potential risk of allowing Chinese nationals to have that kind of access to sensitive information, especially information pertaining to Defense Department.
“The use of Chinese Nationals to service Department of Defense cloud environments? It’s over,” he declared. “We’ve issued a formal letter of concern to Microsoft documenting this breach of trust, and we’re requiring a third party audit of Microsoft’s Digital Escort program — including the code and the submissions by Chinese nationals.”
Hegseth also announced a separate investigation into the program and into all of the Chinese nationals who had been part of it: “Did they put anything in the code that we didn’t know about? We’re going to find out.”
“It blows my mind that I’m even saying these things, it’s such common sense,” Hegseth said as he once again reiterated his intent to remove all Chinese employees from access to DOD information. “We expect vendors doing business with the Department of Defense to put U.S. national security ahead of profit maximization … This never should have happened in the first place.”
