SAN FRANCISCO – Google chairman Eric Schmidt has written a new book in which he calls China an “Internet menace” that backs cyber-crime for economic and political gain.
The New Digital Age – due for release in April – reportedly brands China “the world’s most active and enthusiastic filterer of information” and says China is “the most sophisticated and prolific” hacker of foreign companies.

Beijing has been accused by several governments, foreign companies and organisations of carrying out extensive cyber espionage for many years, seeking to gather information and to control China’s image.

– It isn’t just government agencies that are the target of the Chinese hackers, according to growing reports: US media is also under increasing attack.

The New York Times last week reported that its computers and those of Bloomberg had been attacked by Chinese hackers.

Since then Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal has also reported it has been a victim of Chinee attackers, and the Washington Post said its computer system had been attacked by China-based hackers in 2012.