A huge slogan board stands in front of the U.S. Capitol building during a protest against government surveillance in Washington D.C., capital of the United States, on Oct. 26, 2013. (Xinhua/Fang Zhe)

Analysts say that cyber warfare is one of the tools used in its “hybrid warfare.” Like economic sanctions, terrorist activities, psychological warfare, and military actions, it is a means by which the United States interferes in other countries and achieves its own political goals.

BEIJING, April 28 (Xinhua) — The United States is notorious for its cyber record. Just ask the National Security Agency (NSA), which in 2013 suffered the biggest leak in its history when Edward Snowden, a former CIA contractor, walked out with a vast trove of secret documents.

Snowden disclosed to the press details of extensive internet and phone surveillance by American intelligence. As the scandal widened, multiple media outlets revealed that NSA tapped directly into the servers of internet firms to track online communication in a surveillance program known as Prism.

A decade later, it’s the Pentagon in the limelight this time. A set of highly classified documents from the department were leaked online in recent weeks, in an apparent security breach that revealed U.S. intelligence gathering on some of its key allies. South Korea, one of those affected, has played down any possibility of tension, reiterating its “strong” ties with America.

Those documents also reportedly include military assessments on the Ukraine crisis and CIA reports on a range of global issues. The embarrassing leak has endangered intelligence methods, exposed American strategy and undermined trust among U.S. allies, CNBC quoted former defense department officials and intelligence experts as saying.

SURVEILLANCE OBSESSION

For years, Washington has been spying on the world through electronic eavesdropping and communication interception, with the targets ranging from what it called “strategic competitors” to its European partners.

Anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks in 2015 released a trove of documents titled “Target Tokyo” detailing systematic mass surveillance the agency undertook of Japanese…