ExclusiveUS Monitors HMPV Infection Spike in China

Welcome to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Our top story, the CDC monitoring the HMPV virus as its spread escalates inside China. This as the U.S. sees a slight rise in similar infections on home soil. President-elect Trump once again warning that he's going to take control of the Panama Canal and Greenland. He says that's in the interest of national security and readiness to defeat Look, the Panama Canal is vital to our country. It's being operated by China. China. And we gave the Panama Canal to Panama. We didn't give it to China. And they've abused it. They've abused that gift. Mass protests erupting in China. Thousands gathering in front of a school demanding answers Before we dive into today's top story, I would like to share an important update. You can now catch China In Focus on Genjing World every Tuesday instead of YouTube. To watch, simply click the link in the description box down below or search China In Focus at genjingworld.com. The U.S. keeping watch on a virus that's spreading inside China. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it's monitoring an increase in human metapneumovirus infections in China. The same virus is also seeing a steady increase in the U.S. But this country's around the world remain sensitive to health news after the COVID-19 pandemic originated from China back in 2019. The pandemic cost the U.S. economy 14 trillion dollars and took over 1 million American lives. Back to the HMPV infections in China. Chinese CDC data shows the trend of infections is rising, especially for those under 14 years old. Authorities did not list total infection numbers on the website. By contrast, HMPV infections are increasing much more slowly in the U.S. The U.S. CDC says the number of cases remains at pre-pandemic levels and is not a cause for concern. The agency added some HMPV transmissions can be expected throughout the year, especially during winter. HMPV can cause respiratory disease. Symptoms include cough, fever, nasal congestion and shortness of breath. Currently, there's no specific treatment available, though Moderna is working on creating one. Most patients recover from HMPV with rest and over-the-counter medicine, though the illness can become severe for younger children, the elderly and those with weak immune systems. To prevent the spread of HMPV, the CDC recommends washing hands with soap and avoiding touching the eyes with unwashed hands. In other health news, the U.S. just recorded its first death due to bird flu. The patient was a severe case of the illness in Louisiana. The person was older than 65 years old and suffered from underlying medical conditions. President Trump Tuesday just gave a speech from his Florida home, Mar-a-Lago. He explained why he believes the Panama Canal and Greenland are critical for the U.S. economy and national security, especially for countering the China-led alliance that experts say is at odds with the rules-based world order. Here's the message from incoming President Donald Trump. We need them for economic security. The Panama Canal was built for our military. Look, the Panama Canal is vital to our country. It's being operated by China. China. And we gave the Panama Canal to Panama. We didn't give it to China. And they've abused it. They've abused that gift. Aside from calling out China's influence around the Panama Canal, Trump also complained that the U.S. Navy and commercial ships have been overcharged when passing through the shipping lane. Panama's President Jose Molino has reportedly dismissed both of Trump's statements. As for pushing the U.S. acquisition of Greenland, the region is a Danish territory that lies between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. Well, we need Greenland for national security purposes. We need it for national security. That's for the free world. I'm talking about protecting the free world. You don't even need binoculars. You look outside, you have China ships all over the place. You have Russian ships all over the place. We're not letting that happen. Trump threatened to impose very high-level tariffs on Denmark if the Danish government blocks the deal. The Danish prime ministers said the same day that Greenland is not for sale. That's as Donald Trump Jr., the president-elect's eldest son, just paid a visit to the territory. What's more, a Dubai tycoon announced it would invest $20 billion in the U.S. data sector, with President Trump standing by his side. That comes as Trump vows to defend domestic supply chains to Chinese rivals and eyes further curbs on Beijing's access to advanced U.S. know-how. Mass protests erupted in China over the death of a 17-year-old student. Thousands gathered in front of a vocational school in Shanxi province Sunday, asking authorities to release a relative of the dead. NTD's Juliet Song has more. A video clip circulating online shows a standoff between authorities and protesters in China's Shanxi province. A young man was seen pounding on a door. Multiple protesters were reportedly beaten and taken away by police officers. This comes after a 17-year-old student at the school fell to his death last week. Authorities say he got into a physical altercation with fellow classmates. Following the dispute, his roommate found a wooden stool in front of the window, which was wide open. The student was found lying on the ground in front of the building. His mother suspects there are other reasons behind his death, but local authorities have been tight-lipped about the news. The grieving mother and local residents are now demanding answers. A video clip shows the mother kneeling in front of the school in front of a crowd. A banner behind her reads, give back my child's life. We need to know the truth. More protests followed. In a video clip, protesters threw objects at police officers. Another shows police officers charging toward a female protester, attempting to arrest her. A different police officer got into a physical altercation with a protester. Together, other protesters tried to push down a barricade. Police officers also kicked and beat a protester. We will keep you updated as the story develops. Julie Sun, NTD News. China-linked hackers infiltrated a U.S. telecommunications network, went undetected for 18 months, and gathered data on over 1 million people. NTD's Melina Weisskopf discussed its significance with James Lewis, Senior Vice President, Pritzker Chair, and Director of Strategic Technologies Program at Center for Strategic and International Studies. They also talked about what American citizens can do to protect their own data. Thank you, Jim, for your time today. It's great to have you back on. I want to talk about a Chinese-linked hacking incident. Chinese hackers managed to sneak into a U.S. telecommunications surveillance system network. They targeted 1 million people. This was undetected, and this happened for about 18 months. How did this breach even happen, and how did it remain unnoticed for so long? One of the problems we have in cyber security is people come up with good rules, and then they update them. So FCC and the phone companies were doing what was the right thing to do 5 or 10 years ago. And of course, the Chinese didn't wait for them to catch up. So they exploited some new vulnerabilities. They shouldn't have been new. They exploited a lack of encryption on the management side, and they were able to get in. So some of these hackers, there's a name for one group, the Salt Typhoon Hackers. Those are associated with Chinese intelligence. They specifically targeted telecommunications in Washington, DC. Given what we know about the attack, Jim, how likely do you think it is that important national intelligence was compromised? Well, the intelligence community says that no important information was compromised, and so do the phone companies. In the case of some of the phone companies, I know that's not true. But the Chinese have a powerful incentive to hack into our intelligence system. What they got into was the FISA request system. So if the FBI thinks you are a spy, and they persuade a judge that's accurate, they get a warrant that they can take the phone companies and say, hey, we want to wiretap this person. It'd be great if you were on the other side to know which of your agents were under surveillance. So a big coup for the Chinese, not the best thing. Even if you don't get any classified information, it's still useful for the Chinese. Let's try to direct our conversation to the American people who probably have no idea that this even went on. They don't understand how they're being compromised or why it's important for them to pay attention to it. How might the Chinese Communist Party leverage that stolen information for a geopolitical advantage, maybe through cyber warfare? You know, it is called covert action for a reason. It's supposed to be secret. And in this case, the Chinese are probably annoyed that we found out. But the best thing they could do with it is get, they have agents in the United States. Some people say as many as 200 intelligence officials. They now know which of those 200 agents have been identified and subject to wiretap, to subject to surveillance. That's an immense advantage. That's the main advantage. There's other reports that they got access to texts, email, even phone messages from political leaders. That would be a real benefit too. So you've got both intelligence consequences and political consequences that really are the result of sloppiness on our side. And this has been going on for quite some time, Jen. I'm sure you've been following it very closely. I want to talk about one incident, particularly in fall of 2023, U.S. officials countered a Chinese-backed attack on critical infrastructure that threatened power grids and ports. Do you think our defenses at this point are adequate to counter a similar attack in the future? Clearly our defenses are inadequate and that's not for lack of trying. Part of it is the Chinese are hostile. And so they will, there's hostile, there's a lot of them, they have a lot of money and they're going to keep trying. Where we have not pushed hard enough is on holding companies accountable and holding agencies accountable to making sure that people are doing best practices. And when I say best practices, I mean the best practices of 2024, not of 2014. So we have not done enough. The Chinese aren't going to stop given how we work now. It's a real problem. So the fact that we haven't done enough, I'm sure many are starting to see through that, especially if you work in the intelligence community or in Congress or in D.C. particularly. Some U.S. officials are now choosing to move to encrypted platforms like Signal, for example. Jim, do you think moving to these types of platforms is sufficient or do you think there are still other vulnerabilities? I use Signal. Not a plug for the company, don't know them. But yeah, if you don't use encrypted messaging, you are vulnerable. I thought we had this debate 20 years ago, should we encrypt traffic or not? And I thought at that point the answer was yes, you need to encrypt. But apparently not everyone was paying attention. That's one of the things that happened with this telecom hack, is that the Chinese have identified, as have the Russians and have others, probably us, that going after the primary target can be difficult, right? Going after the company or the agency won't hack. But going after their service provider, their third-party service provider, can be a lot easier. Now, with that being said, you had mentioned earlier that you feel that companies aren't doing enough, that that's where one of the vulnerabilities lies, is they're not doing enough to try to prevent this type of cyber attack from occurring. With that being said, what steps do you think the government and private companies should take to secure those telecommunications moving forward? Yeah, it's a problem because the Chinese aren't getting the message. They don't want to get the message. And this administration and its predecessors have tried to tell the Chinese, hey, you've got to back off, and they aren't backing off. So over of all of this is our inability to design an effective response to China. For the companies, a lot of it is what we call hygiene, basic hygiene. Are you doing basic stuff? Do you have two-factor authentication? Most of the audience will probably have this on their banks. That was a regulatory decision, where you log in, it's not just a password, you then have to confirm your identity through a text. Amazingly enough, some of the victims in this situation weren't using that. So we need to think about how do we get companies to do a better job? How do we get the regulatory agencies to stay abreast of things? And we need to think about how do we persuade the Chinese that we're serious about them having gone too far? All good information. Thank you so much for your insights, Jim. It's great to have you back on as always. Thank you. US Steel and Nippon Steel are suing the Biden administration for blocking their nearly $15 billion merger deal last week. The lawsuit was filed on Monday. It accuses President Biden and his cabinet of undermining the company's rights in what they describe as the administration's unfair review. NTD's Flora Hua is following the story. Flora, can you tell us? Yes, it might have to shut down its plants in Pennsylvania and Indiana. The two steel giants have declared that the deal will not harm US national security or American supply chain, but will enhance them instead in the face of threats posed by China. Back to the legal battle, although Nippon and US Steel are unlikely to win, the lawsuit could allow the companies more time to convince incoming President Donald Trump to keep the merger deal. That's despite Trump having just vowed to block the deal on social media last month. He had previously expressed the confidence in making US Steel more competitive through tariffs. But a change of heart from Trump isn't entirely out of the question, given his shifting stance on TikTok, for example. The president-elect supported banning the app back in 2020, but he reversed that position earlier last year, both to avoid strengthening Meta's Facebook and because he credits the app with helping him reach young voters during his 2024 campaign. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is on his final expected overseas trip as the US top diplomat. He met with Japan's new prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, in Tokyo on Tuesday. There, he acknowledged the importance of the US-Japan friendship in maintaining Indo-Pacific peace. Here's what Secretary Blinken had to say. Japan, the United States are leading the way and I have great confidence that will continue for many, many years to come. Blinken didn't disclose details about his meeting with the Japanese leader, but he did praise Japan for being one of the first countries to stand up for Ukraine after Russia invaded the country in 2022. Now, he's headed for the next and last destination of the trip, Paris, where he will likely discuss affairs in the Middle East and Ukraine with French officials. Blinken has served as the top United States diplomat since the beginning of 2021. Coming up, Taiwan is launching its first military drill of the new year. This after Chinese leader Xi Jinping reiterated his ambition to take control of the island. Taiwanese authorities said their government system was attacked roughly 28 times every second on average last year. Most of them trace back to China. And a magnitude 6.8 quake rocked one of Tibet's holiest cities, killing at least 126 people. More on that after the break here on China In Focus. Welcome back to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Rolling tanks, firing shots. Taiwan kicking off a military exercise on Tuesday with a goal, highlighting its determination to defend itself. This comes after Chinese leader Xi Jinping reiterated his ambition to take Taiwan in a New Year speech. On Tuesday, Taiwan detected 24 Chinese fighter jets and drones near the island. Beijing regularly deploys jets near the island on a daily basis. Taiwan's defense ministry said it's been receiving lots of new equipment. We pay a lot of attention to training our troops to use the new equipment, and we will make sure the new equipment becomes an important part of our overall military power to assist in defense operations. The Chinese Communist Party sees Taiwan as part of China, despite never having ruled it. The U.S. doesn't have diplomatic relations with Taiwan, but is bound by law to sell weapons to the island so it can defend itself. Next, new numbers from Taiwan on cybersecurity. In the latest report published on Sunday, the island's National Security Bureau said its governmental network endured over 2.4 million cyberattacks daily last year. Breaking that down, it means the network was attacked about 28 times every second. The agency says it has traced most of the attacks to the Chinese Communist Party's cyber force. Although most of them were effectively intercepted, the number of attacks doubled that of the year before. China-backed hacking operations also increased 20 percent compared to the year before. The top target was the island's telecommunications sector, which saw a 650 percent increase compared to the previous year. The island's critical infrastructure, including ports, highways and key supply chains, were also among the targets. China has started issuing citizenship ID cards to Taiwanese tourists that visit the country. The island's government is warning its people to not buy Beijing's tricks, saying the Chinese regime's ultimate goal is to take control of the island, even by force if necessary. A senior official warned the documents could be China's excuse to exploit these Taiwanese citizens' rights, which could undermine the island's judicial system. Besides citizenship, Taiwanese officials say Beijing has also been proactively getting Taiwanese tourists to apply for Chinese bank accounts and phone numbers. A powerful earthquake just hit Tibet. A magnitude 6.8 quake rocked one of Tibet's holiest cities on Tuesday, killing at least 126 people. The site is located nearby the China-Nepal border. The earthquake also shook buildings in Nepal and India. The quake's epicenter was in the rural county of Tingri, according to the China Earthquake Network Center. The area is known as the Northern Gateway to the Everest region. China's state-run television said that at least 130 people were injured on the Tibetan side. Chinese President Xi Jinping called for all-out rescue efforts. More than 1,500 local firefighters and rescue workers have been dispatched to affected areas, China's Xinhua news agency reported. It added that some 22,000 items, including tents, coats, quilts and beds, have also been sent to the quake-hit region. Southwestern parts of China, Nepal and northern India are frequently hit by earthquakes caused by the collision of the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates. Millions of civil servants in China got a surprise wage increase this week. That says Beijing seeks to boost spending and revitalize its troubled economy. According to multiple media outlets, state employees received an average monthly pay increase of up to 500 yuan, or about 70 U.S. dollars. It's been nearly a decade since the last public wage hike back in 2015. And during the COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of state workers in China also faced pay cuts. Senior economist at the Economist says Beijing aims to boost spending. China has been facing challenges in recent years, including a major property crisis and deflation, plus the potential for high U.S. tariffs on exports when President-elect Donald Trump takes office. A China affairs analyst says the pay raise has another goal besides the economic one. Recently, financial pressures are severe across the country, leading to measures such as pay cuts, salary reductions and withholding bonuses. These actions have hurt the interests of government workers, causing resentment. So this policy serves as a form of compensation for them, an attempt to win them over. Wang added that the policy could burden China's already-indebted local bureaus under the Chinese Communist Party even more. There are tens of millions of civil servants across the country. If each person were to receive an average increase of 500 or 300 yuan, it would amount to tens of billions. And over the course of a year, it would reach hundreds of billions or even 1 to 2 trillion yuan. Local governments are already burdened with significant debt, facing immense financial pressure, with no surplus funds at hand. According to Chinese authorities, by the end of 2023, the combined debt of the Chinese state at all levels had surpassed 11 trillion dollars. That's roughly 65 percent of the entire country's GDP for that year. That's all for today's China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. If you have any feedback on the show or have something you'd like to see us cover, send us an email at chinainfocusntd.com. We'd love to hear from you. For around-the-clock original news coverage, visit us at ntd.com or download our NTD app. Thanks for watching. See you tomorrow.