The U.S. Department of Defense will no longer allow China-based engineers to work on Microsoft cloud services tied to Pentagon networks. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the immediate ban after a ProPublica investigation revealed that Microsoft contractors in China had poorly supervised access to sensitive U.S. government systems.
00:00U.S. Defense Secretary Peek Hexeth says China-based engineers will no longer be used to support U.S. cloud services provided by Microsoft.
00:09And that's why today I'm announcing that China will no longer have any involvement whatsoever in our cloud services effective immediately.
00:19Hexeth's comments come after Microsoft also said it would stop using China-based engineers for its Defense Department contracts.
00:26The change comes following a report from the outlet ProPublica.
00:30The report said some of Microsoft's contractors are based in China and had access to sensitive U.S. government systems with little supervision, posing a cybersecurity threat.
