Remarks delivered at Newsweek Romania's IT & Cyber Summit 2026 | May 28, 2026
At Newsweek Romania's IT & Cyber Summit 2026, Ambassador (Ret.) Adrian Zuckerman issued a stark warning: Romania and other democratic states are increasingly in the crosshairs of an intensifying hybrid and cyber war, with China and Russia deploying social media platforms, disinformation campaigns, and digital infrastructure as weapons.
Watch the translated video on Alianta's YouTube channel: LINK
Speaking before an audience of technology and security professionals, Zuckerman drew on his experience as U.S. Ambassador to Romania (2019–2021) to lay out the scope of the threat. Cyber attacks, he argued, are not isolated incidents but part of a coordinated effort by authoritarian regimes to destabilize democratic institutions and erode public trust.
TikTok as a National Security Threat
Zuckerman singled out TikTok as one of the most serious threats democratic governments face today. He described the platform as one of the biggest criminal actors for a criminal state — namely, China — pointing to its documented involvement in elections across Romania, Moldova, and parts of Europe and the United States, where it has been used as a vector for propaganda and political influence.
The core problem, in his view, is structural: the platform's connection to China's digital infrastructure. As long as TikTok is connected to a server in China, it doesn't matter who owns it, Zuckerman said. It doesn't matter if there are transactions or shareholder changes.
'All Chinese Products Connected to Wi-Fi Are Espionage Tools'
Zuckerman extended the warning beyond social media to Chinese-manufactured hardware. He flagged video equipment and smart devices used in critical institutions across Romania, pointing specifically to surveillance cameras at the Cotroceni Palace — Romania's presidential residence.
The cameras at Cotroceni are made by a company that everyone in the world knows makes Chinese spy equipment. How can you have cameras like that there? His broader point: any Chinese device with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity is, by design, a potential collection platform. All Chinese products with Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity are methods of espionage and intelligence gathering about the environment they are used in, he stated.
He also raised concerns about economic dependency on cheap Chinese technology. Citing Huawei as an example, he argued that the company's strategy of offering subsidized products is not commercial — it is intelligence-driven. Huawei gives you watches, calculators, and almost everything for free, because for them it is more important to gather information than to make a profit.
'War Is No Longer Just Tanks and Missiles'
Beyond hardware and platforms, Zuckerman pushed back against what he sees as a failure of imagination among democratic governments — an inability to fully grasp the nature of hybrid warfare.
We must recognize that we are in a war, he said. Russians, Chinese, and North Koreans are trying to destabilize Western democratic governments. War is no longer just tanks and missiles. It is a cyber war that tries to destroy the ability of governments to govern and to destroy people's faith in their governments and create chaos.
He called for a coordinated NATO and European-level response, arguing that many democratic states have not yet internalized the full dimension of this hybrid threat.
This post is adapted from an article originally published in Newsweek Romania on May 28, 2026, by Florin Budescu. Ambassador (Ret.) Adrian Zuckerman serves as Chair of Alianta, the Washington, DC-based organization dedicated to strengthening U.S.-Romania relations. He served as U.S. Ambassador to Romania from 2019 to 2021.
