Two alleged Chinese hackers carried out an extensive campaign on behalf of Beijing's main intelligence agency to steal trade secrets and other information from US government agencies and "a who's who" of major corporations in America and nearly a dozen other nations, US officials say.
The indictment is the latest in a series of US Justice Department criminal cases targeting Chinese cyber-espionage and coincided with an announcement by Britain blaming China's Ministry of State Security for trade-secret pilfering affecting Western nations.
The alleged hackers, one of whom is nicknamed "Godkiller", are accused of breaching computer networks beginning as early as 2006 in a range of industries, including aviation and space, finance, biotechnology oil and gas, satellites and pharmaceuticals.
Prosecutors say they also obtained the names, social security numbers and other personal information of more than 100,000 US Navy personnel.
In a new twist reflecting corporate computing's evolution, the hackers often infiltrated cloud computing companies and other major technology providers to indirectly reach clients' valuable documents.
Prosecutors said the alleged hackers stole "hundreds of gigabytes" of data, breaching computers of more than 45 entities in 12 states including NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab and Goddard Space Center.
The hackers, identified as members of the group APT10, or "Stone Panda", are not in custody. Prosecutors said their names were Zhu Hua and Zhang Shillong.
More than 90 per cent of Justice Department economic espionage cases in the past seven years involve China, Deputy Attorney-General Rod Rosenstein, and more than two-thirds of trade secrets cases were connected to the country.
"China's state-sponsored actors are the most active perpetrators of economic espionage," FBI Director Chris Wray said in announcing the case.
"While we welcome fair competition, we cannot and will not tolerate illegal hacking, stealing or cheating."
China responded on Friday by accusing the US of "fabricating facts".
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in a statement the indictment severely violated the basic norms of international relations and damages US-China co-operation.
Hua called the charges "completely vile" and said the US has long engaged in "cyber-theft".
In recent months, the Justice Department has filed separate cases against several Chinese intelligence officials and hackers.
A case filed in October marked the first time that a Chinese Ministry of State Security officer was extradited to the US to stand trial.
The British government accused China of conducting a "widespread and significant" campaign of cyber-espionage against the UK and its allies.
The Foreign Office said a group known as APT 10 - the same one cited by the US - carried out "a malicious cyber campaign targeting intellectual property and sensitive commercial data in Europe, Asia and the US".
It said the group "almost certainly continues to target a range of global companies, seeking to gain access to commercial secrets".
Australia joined demands China shut down the Beijing-backed ATP10, with Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton saying its "sustained cyber intrusions" were significant and a "serious concern".
