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President Trump dismissed a report on Chinese and Russian spies listening in on his cellphone calls "soooo wrong !," yet he acknowledged the crucial vulnerability being exploited by foreign agents – that he uses a cellphone to make calls.
The article, published Wednesday in The New York Times, how American intelligence agencies have figured out what China and Russia are eavesdropping on calls Mr. Trump makes of his iPhones, and that the president has calls on it are not secure. In addition, Trump thinks, what is it? Mr. Trump thinks, what is it? American officials.
Mr. Trump jumped on the news early on Thursday, writing on Twitter that "so-called experts on Trump" at The Times had been written down to the point that it was so riddled with errors "I do not have time here to correct it."
He added: "I only use Government Phones, and have only one seldom used government cellphone. Story is soooo wrong! "
Mr. Trump followed up on three hours later with a second tweet, saying that The Times "has a new Fake Story that the Chinese and Russians (glad they are finally added China) are listening to all of my calls on cellphones. Except that I rarely use a cellphone, and when I do it's government authorized. I like Hard Lines. Just more made up Fake News! "
According to The Times' report, it is the use of any cellphone by Mr. Trump – government issued or not – that is the problem. The vulnerabilities exploited by China and Russia have nothing to do with Mr. Trump's actual devices, the officials said. Rather, the president's calls are intercepted as they move through the cell towers, cables and switches that make up national and international cellphone networks, they said.
"We are confident in the accuracy of our reporting and will let the story speak for itself, "Danielle Rhoades Ha, the Times spokeswoman, said in response to the president's tweets.
Officials said the president has two official iPhones that have been altered by the National Security Agency to limit their abilities – and vulnerabilities – and a third personal phone that is no different from the millions of iPhones in use around the world.
Mr. Trump said that it was only late last year that he finally began to make a complaint. But the Mr. Trump kept his personal phone because he did not have any numbers stored on the phone, they said.
For many months, Mr. Trump also said that the said said. He found the situation aggravating, complaining to helpers, Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Fla., Asked how to reach him.
American officials know well how easy it is for a government to intercept cellphone calls. Doing so is considered President Xi Jinping of China and President Vladimir Putin or Russia, President of the United States.
Mr. Trump, though, talks about his old friends and contacts. Officials said he's been using landlines more than a few years ago – it's still more secure than cellphones – but he's still connecting to his iPhones when he does not want the calls to the White House switchboard.
Multiple West Wing officials said that the head of the Oval Office Operations, Jordan Karem, has told colleagues that he is in charge of the president of the country. White House officials said that an email goes to a number of officials each morning detailing the call log.
The officials quoted in The Times report said they were not overly worried. The president rarely digs into the details of covert and military operations, and he has long been paranoid about his calls being recorded.
China and Russia, for their part, also pushed back on the Times report, ridiculing the reporting without exactly denying it.
A spokeswoman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Hua Chunying, suggests that "some people in the United States" were competing for "the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay," and even used a familiar Trump trope, warning the newspaper that it was risked called "fake news."
The best way to avoid having calls is to avoid "any modern communication devices," she said.
Ms. Hua followed with a plug for a Chinese competitor of the iPhones that Mr. Trump favors. "If they are very worried about iPhones being tapped, they can use Huawei," she said, referring to the giant telecommunications that has itself raised security concerns in the United States.
In Russia, the Kremlin's spokesman, Dmitry S. Peskov, offered a similarly bemused response. "Reasonable for this information," he said, according to Ria Novosti.
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