US Could Use Tariffs to Fight Chinese Hacking Threats, Lawmaker Says

Artificial intelligence, particularly quantum computing, will be a key in future cybersecurity, experts say.

Rep. William Timmons (R-S.C.) speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 5, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

WASHINGTON—The United States should use tariffs to deter Chinese state-sponsored cyber attacks, a House lawmaker told The Epoch Times.

Rep. William Timmons (R-S.C.), chairman of the Oversight Committee’s Subcommittee on Military and Foreign Affairs, made the remarks on April 2, which President Donald Trump called the “Liberation Day” as he announced his reciprocal tariffs on U.S. trading partners with an aim to erase trade deficits.

Timmons suggested that the Trump administration use tariffs as part of its cybersecurity strategy to hold foreign adversaries accountable and establish deterrents against potential malign cyber activities in the future.

In 2001, the United States invaded Afghanistan to dismantle al-Qaeda for its role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, “so it’s not unreasonable if a terrorist or a foreign state is going to cause immense damage and threaten our national security that we just use tariffs to hold them accountable, to extract economic pain,” Timmons said, while chairing a hearing on Salt Typhoon.

This Chinese state-sponsored hacking group is known for having compromised at least nine major U.S. telecom networks, including Verizon, AT&T, and CenturyLink.

Timmons told The Epoch Times that his suggestion is not hard to implement, as long as the U.S. government can identify the party responsible for a cyberattack.

The State Department has offered $10 million in rewards for information on another hacking group called i-Soon, which engaged in cyberattacks against U.S. government and other U.S. and global organizations, including The Epoch Times.

“I mean, at the end of the day, if the federal government steps in, makes a business that has experienced a cyberattack or a breach whole, and then extracts the damages from the country of origin. That seems pretty simple to me,” Timmons said. “I think it’s a great tool in our toolbox that the president clearly is willing to use.

“He can use tariffs to secure our critical infrastructure and our businesses from future attacks by making them whole.”

Trump slapped a 34 percent tariff on China on Wednesday, on top of the 20 percent rate he instituted earlier this year.

Salt Typhoon has targeted the phone communications of senior political figures, including Trump and Vice President JD Vance, as well as then-Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign, before the 2024 presidential election. The group was also responsible for stealing documents from the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, which implements U.S. economic and trade sanctions.

A Chinese research ship proceeds to dock at a port in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on Oct. 25, 2023. Ishara Kodikara/AFP via Getty Images

Josh Steinman, chief executive officer of cybersecurity company Galvanick, was one of the witnesses at the hearing. He previously served as a senior director for cyber policy at the National Security Council during the previous Trump administration.

Steinman said it’s time for the United States to take a more aggressive posture. In this way, “we throw sand in their gears, we force them to spend time and effort to defend against our counterattacks, and those could be ones that are managed at the national level,” he said.

Steinman added that he believes the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its military intelligence apparatus are already in a “wartime footing.”

They try to “make us think, oh everything’s okay, we can just sort of be friends,” he said. “They do this while hacking us blatantly, while then denying when they get confronted.”

Artificial Intelligence

Experts at the hearing noted the threat of Chinese hackers using artificial intelligence (AI) in their operations.

“Our adversaries are not waiting. They are actively integrating AI into their offensive cyber arsenals—using machine learning to automate reconnaissance, exploit development, and the coordination of persistent, targeted attacks,” Edward Amoroso, research professor at New York University and CEO of TAG Cyber LLC, a global research and advisory company, said in his prepared testimony.

“The United States must lead in building AI-powered cybersecurity systems that can anticipate, detect, and autonomously mitigate emerging threats to critical infrastructure,” Amoroso stated.

U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, in a February report, said Chinese espionage in 2024 surged by 150 percent, and that hackers increasingly used AI technologies in their targeted attacks.

“It’s a big issue. It’s really important,” Steinman told The Epoch Times. He said it’s why “it would be smart for us to prevent Chinese AI companies from the United States.”

Amoroso suggested at the hearing that the United States “take legislative steps to encourage proactive defense strategies,” including programs to fund research and development for critical infrastructure protection, increase workforce on AI and cybersecurity, and to “modernize policy frameworks that still reflect a pre-AI threat model.”

Amoroso told lawmakers at the hearing that public-key cryptography—used by federal agencies and critical infrastructure in the United States—is specifically at risk for hackers equipped with quantum computers.

“And it’s entirely possible that the PRC could have a bunch of those in the basement,” Amoroso said.

In January, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) explained on its website that within the next 10 to 20 years, quantum computers could be capable of breaking cryptography in a few hours or days. In contrast, conventional computers today would take billions of years to achieve the same task.

In other words, foreign adversaries could be thinking that they would be able to access the encrypted data they steal now in the future, in a form of attack known as “harvest now, decrypt later,” according to the GAO.

Timmons told The Epoch Times such a strategy is “scary.”

“It’s definitely a major challenge—AI and quantum computing,” he said.

“We’re going to have to invest in our defenses and create a deterrent threat using offense.”

Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas), member of the Subcommittee on Military and Foreign Affairs, agreed that the United States needs to step up both its defense and offense regarding cybersecurity.

Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas) speaks during a hearing where Dr. Anthony Fauci testifies before the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic in Washington on June 3, 2024. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

It’s “kind of why we were talking about skating to where the puck is going from our defense apparatus,” Cloud told The Epoch Times.

“Certainly, we need to let the CCP and any other bad actors know that their actions against us and our people will not go unaddressed,“ he said. ”But then we also need to shore up our infrastructure.”

Timmons said he hopes to have more conversations on this issue.

The United States needs to “make sure that we’re able to use every tool in our toolbox to hold both nation-state actors and non-state actors accountable,” he said at the hearing.