The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has subpoenaed China Mobile, China Telecom, and China Unicom after the three state-owned firms failed to respond to a formal congressional inquiry regarding their potential ties to Chinese military and intelligence agencies.
The subpoenas demand full compliance by May 7, 2025, and escalate a bipartisan investigation into whether the firms continue to operate digital infrastructure within the United States despite federal bans.
The investigation is being led by Committee Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL), who stated that intelligence gathered from private sector sources indicates that the companies may still be operating network Points of Presence (PoPs), cloud infrastructure, and data center access on U.S. soil. This would be in defiance of earlier Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rulings that barred the companies from providing licensed telecom services due to national security concerns. The FCC denied China Mobile's application in 2019 and revoked the authorizations of China Telecom and China Unicom in 2021 and 2022, respectively.
Despite these restrictions, lawmakers say the companies may still be providing unlicensed services, such as wholesale internet routing and cloud computing, using subsidiaries or partnerships that fall outside FCC oversight. This activity raises fears that the Chinese government could leverage such infrastructure for cyber espionage, surveillance, or disruption of U.S. critical infrastructure.
These concerns are not theoretical. In November 2024, the FBI and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) disclosed that Chinese state-sponsored hackers had infiltrated multiple U.S. telecom networks, accessing sensitive call records and intercepting communications linked to U.S. political figures. That campaign reportedly also exploited legal data requests to gain deeper intelligence, highlighting the systemic vulnerabilities of the telecommunications sector to nation-state actors.
The Committee's latest action also follows an April 2025 investigative report from iVerify, which revealed that Chinese telecom interconnect providers such as China Mobile International and China Telecom Global had embedded surveillance capabilities into the global telecom backbone. These firms exploited unencrypted signaling protocols like SS7 and Diameter to perform passive surveillance, active location tracking, and even remote malware deployment across dozens of countries — including those allied with the U.S. Intelligence Community.
A spokesperson for China's embassy in Washington criticized the move, stating that the U.S. is “over-stretching the concept of national security” and using state power to unfairly target Chinese companies. The three telecom firms have not responded to the subpoena or to media requests for comment.
The House Committee has indicated that non-compliance may lead to further legal action, including contempt proceedings. The Committee's ongoing investigation is likely to expand as lawmakers seek to close remaining loopholes in U.S. telecom oversight and prevent state-backed actors from exploiting technical and regulatory gray zones.
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