Communication devices found on Chinese-built cranes located at US ports spark espionage concerns

A congressional espionage investigation uncovered communication devices on some Chinese-built cargo cranes located at several U.S. ports, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

Representatives from the Department of Homeland Security and Coast Guard stated during a recent House Subcommittee on Transportation and Maritime Security hearing that 80% of cargo cranes in the United States are built in China.

Christa Brzozowski, acting assistant secretary for trade and economic security at the DHS, stated, "We absolutely agree and we do see an overreliance on these People's Republic of China (PRC) manufacturer cranes," CNBC reported.

More than 99% of the cargo coming to the country from overseas moves through seaports. U.S. ports produce $5.4 trillion in economic activity and support the employment of approximately 31 million Americans, according to the American Association of Port Authorities.

Last year, national security and Department of Justice officials warned that the Chinese-built seaport cranes, made by Shanghai-based manufacturing company ZPMC, could be a Trojan horse, the WSJ stated. At the time, China said that the Biden administration's espionage concerns were nothing more than "paranoia-driven."

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote, "The accusation that China uses ship-to-shore cranes to collect data is completely unfounded. The US needs to respect the principles of market economy & fair competition, and provide a fair, just and non-discriminatory business environment."

The AAPA wrote off the claims as "sensational," stating there was no evidence to support the administration's concerns, CNBC reported.

On February 21, President Biden signed an executive order to "bolster the security of the nation's ports." The administration noted that it planned to invest more than $20 billion in the production of port cranes to bring manufacturing back to America.

The WSJ reported Thursday that a probe into the cranes found that several contained communications devices that were not requested, including more than a dozen cellular modems. Such devices are often used to monitor crane operations remotely.

In December, one port told the House Homeland Security Committee, "We are unsure who installed the modems, as they were on the cranes when we first saw them in China." The port speculated that the modems were installed in 2017 when the cranes were built in China. The devices were removed in 2023.

Republican Rep. Mark Green (Tenn.) told the WSJ that China "is looking for every opportunity to collect valuable intelligence and position themselves to exploit vulnerabilities by systematically burrowing into America's critical infrastructure — including in the maritime sector."

"The United States has clearly overlooked this threat for far too long," Green noted.

Last week, the Homeland Security Committee told ZMPC that the communication devices do not "contribute to the operation of the (ship-to-shore) cranes or maritime infrastructure and is not part of any existing contract between ZPMC and the receiving U.S. maritime port," WSJ reported.

ZMPC has not responded to requests for comment from CNBC or the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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