{"id":582465,"date":"2026-08-12T14:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T14:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/582465\/"},"modified":"2026-08-12T14:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T14:22:09","slug":"chinas-escalating-cyberattacks-threaten-taiwans-national-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/582465\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s Escalating Cyberattacks Threaten Taiwan\u2019s National Security"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amid intensifying cross-Strait tensions, Taiwan is among the world\u2019s most frequent targets of cyberattacks, predominantly attributed to Chinese state-backed hackers. Taiwan\u2019s National Security Bureau (NSB) <\/a>\u00a0has assessed that infrastructure on the island experienced a daily average of 2.63 million cyberattacks in 2025, more than double that of 2023. Energy, emergency rescue, hospitals, and communications infrastructure were the sectors that faced\u00a0the most significant increases in the number of attacks in 2025, as compared to the previous year. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

The increase in cyberattacks reflects Beijing\u2019s growing concerns over Taiwan\u2019s political landscape and global positioning. After over four decades of democratization, Taiwan is recognized as the 2nd freest country in Asia<\/a>. Its thriving chip industry<\/a> positions it globally as an invaluable economic asset, including in advancing China\u2019s own semiconductor technology<\/a>. Wary of Taiwan\u2019s rapid political and technological development would make the cross-strait unification less appealing for the people in Taiwan, Beijing has used various tactics to intimidate Taiwan from developing a strong national identity. With advances in technology shaping the evolution of gray zone warfare tactics, cyberattacks have become an integral tool in the People\u2019s Republic of China (PRC)\u2019s efforts to deter Taiwan from codifying its de facto independence. They are also an important mechanism to test Taiwan\u2019s resilience to a Chinese blockade should Beijing decide to invade.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cyberattacks Targeting\u00a0 Taiwan\u2019s Political and Diplomatic Engagement \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

China further intensified cyberattacks on Taiwan following Lai Ching-te\u2019s election as Taiwan\u2019s president in January 2024. Chinese leadership views President Lai as a \u201cseparatist<\/a>\u201d who will drive the island away from Beijing\u2019s ultimate goal of unification under PRC control. Many of Lai\u2019s public statements\u2014such as that \u201cthe Republic of China (Taiwan) and the People\u2019s Republic of China are not subordinate to each other<\/a>\u201d (during his inauguration speech on May 20, 2024), or that \u201cChina should take back the Chinese territory occupied by Russia<\/a> since the 19th century if China cares about the Chinese territorial integrity\u201d (September 2024)\u2014have been condemned as provocative<\/a> by the PRC, and even used as justifications <\/a>for launching military exercises around Taiwan. Launching cyberattacks has become a routine element of the PRC\u2019s strategy to intimidate Taiwanese leadership into not making any political moves signifying Taiwan\u2019s de facto independence: the NSB\u2019s 2025 report recorded peaks in the number of Chinese cyberattacks<\/a> while President Lai delivered public speeches or traveled abroad for diplomatic activities.<\/p>\n

By targeting government services and infrastructure, China intends to weaken the Taiwanese public\u2019s confidence in their government\u2019s ability to protect the country. This aim was further operationalized through the displaying of slogans on hacked websites that claimed cross-strait unification had been accomplished. A survey conducted by\u00a0the Taiwan Network Information Center\u00a0<\/a>in 2024 shows that only 41 percent of respondents in Taiwan believed the government capable of responding to various types of cyberattacks, whereas over 51 percent of them had complete or partial distrust. The targeting of public works infrastructure and incorporation of disinformation as a component of PRC cyberattack methodology emphasizes the severity of this threat to public trust in Taiwan. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Image: A Taiwan Ministry of National Defense \u201cGraphic of Communist Chinese Methods of Cognitive Warfare\u201d conducted online. (Image source: ROC National Defense Report 2021<\/a>)<\/p>\n

China has used cyberattacks to isolate Taiwan from the global community. During former US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi\u2019s visit to Taiwan in August 2022, several of Taiwan\u2019s government websites, public transportation websites, and retail sector sites were hacked<\/a>, their contents replaced with messaging criticizing the Speaker\u2019s visit. Other Western nations with closer ties to Taiwan, like the Czech Republic, have faced increased cyberattacks<\/a> by Chinese hackers in recent years.<\/p>\n

Cyberattacks have become part of the People\u2019s Liberation Army (PLA)\u2019s routine actions against Taiwan, in tandem with the growing number of PLA aircraft crossing either the median line of the Taiwan Strait or Taiwan\u2019s Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), from 380 sorties in 2020 to 5,709 in 2025<\/a>. In the event of an invasion, China might use cyberattacks to interfere with Taiwan\u2019s communications network operations with the outside world\u2014thereby disrupting Taiwan\u2019s defense efforts and delaying international assistance. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

A Tool to Sustain Chinese Economic Influence\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The PRC leadership believe economic integration across the Taiwan Strait would give China an advantage in exercising political coercion. In recent years, however, China has gradually lost its economic leverage due to declining economic ties across the Strait. According to Taiwan\u2019s Ministry of Finance<\/a>, China and Hong Kong\u2019s shares in Taiwan\u2019s exports dropped from 44 percent in 2020 to 27 percent in 2025. China accounted for nearly 84 percent of Taiwan\u2019s outward foreign direct investment in 2010; the share declined to less than 4 percent in 2025, according to data from Taiwan\u2019s Ministry of Economic Affairs<\/a> and calculations by the author. China\u2019s economic slowdown<\/a>, due to property market stagnation, low private consumption, and trade tensions with the United States, has further weakened its capability to threaten Taiwan economically. To counterbalance its fading economic influence, cyberattacks have been used more frequently to menace Taiwanese businesses. Chinese hackers might try to extract huge payments for unlocking important data, or even demand political concessions from the Taiwanese government and private companies.<\/p>\n

Taiwan\u2019s hardware and semiconductor industry<\/a> is the most targeted of its sectors. As the largest chip maker in the world, the shutdown of chip plants due to cyberattacks could inflict a significant impact on the global economy, including that of China. Although China might not want to sabotage Taiwan\u2019s semiconductor industry for the sake of its own domestic manufacturing production and economy, it might intend to steal technology information and sensitive business data from Taiwanese semiconductor firms through Chinese hacks. US export control measures<\/a> have made it increasingly difficult for China to purchase equipment and key components with high-technology intensity from Taiwan, further incentivizing China to find other means to acquire its technology. The loss of intellectual property rights and overseas customer information to Chinese hackers could risk collapsing the entire semiconductor industry in Taiwan. Both Taiwan\u2019s economy and the wider global supply chain network would suffer catastrophically from major disruption toTaiwan\u2019s semiconductor industry.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

Taiwan Needs a Strong Cybersecurity Policy to Respond to China\u2019s Surging Cyberthreats<\/p>\n

China\u2019s cyberattacks on Taiwan can be traced back over 20 years. Nevertheless, it was not until 2016 that former President Tsai Ing-Wen started to incorporate cybersecurity into Taiwan\u2019s national security strategy. The Ministry of Digital Affairs (MODA), established in 2022, is responsible for planning and implementing cybersecurity policies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Along with the establishment of the \u00a0cybersecurity department, regulations, and initiatives, the government allocated NT 8.8 billion (about USD 300 million) for its national cybersecurity development program<\/a> over four years (2025-2028).\u00a0Despite rising expenditures on cybersecurity<\/a> over the past few years, it is not sufficient to cope with the increasing volume of \u00a0cyberattacks. Compared to the top 20 spenders on cybersecurity worldwide<\/a>, the Taiwanese government\u2019s expenditure (USD 75 million per year from 2025 to 2028) is far behind. A greater cybersecurity budget could reinforce Taiwan\u2019s cyber defense against the growing cyberthreat to Taiwan\u2019s national security.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The shortage of talent in cybersecurity<\/a> is another concern. Over the past few decades, Taiwan has focused on building hardware manufacturing capacity, but software development<\/a> is lagging. The lack of talent in cybersecurity poses a challenge to firms in Taiwan, which are increasingly aware of Chinese cyber-threats \u2013 and thus growing their investment in securing their business data. In addition to on-the-job training for current employment, expanding talent acquisition from overseas is key in tackling the immediate cyber threat from China.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Greater international cooperation in cybersecurity with like-minded countries is another way to enhance Taiwan\u2019s digital competence and strengthen its national defense. International cooperation can incorporate private business participation, which will assist the cybersecurity industry\u2019s development potential and build Taiwan\u2019s strength from it. For example, the Taiwan Cybersecurity Resiliency Act<\/a> of 2023 aimed to promote military cybersecurity cooperation between the United States and Taiwan, including protection of military networks and infrastructure, and cybersecurity training activities. Taiwan and Paraguay also concluded a partnership in information security and smart technology, digital governance, and judicial cooperation<\/a> in May this year. More collaboration with other countries should be promoted.<\/p>\n

China\u2019s persistent cyberattacks are an imminent threat to Taiwan\u2019s national security and sovereignty. Taiwan must not hesitate to build up a strong cyber defense system in order to protect its economic assets<\/a>, public trust, and democratic values.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The main point: Cyberattacks have become an important tool in China\u2019s plans for cross-Strait unification. Through cyberattacks, China aims to intimidate Taiwanese leaders, weaken trust in Taiwan\u2019s government, and maintain its influence over Taiwanese businesses. In order to combat this, Taiwan needs to increase its budget for acquiring cybersecurity talent, hardware, and software, as well as to increase collaboration with other countries to better defend Taiwan\u2019s democracy and economy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Amid intensifying cross-Strait tensions, Taiwan is among the world\u2019s most frequent targets of cyberattacks, predominantly attributed to Chinese…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":582466,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[114,1657,4287,6557,263518,85,46,263519],"class_list":["post-582465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-china","tag-cybersecurity","tag-diplomacy","tag-economic-coercion","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-ministry-of-digital-affairs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=582465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582465\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/582466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=582465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=582465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=582465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}