The attack was reportedly detected on 20 January and affected an array of publications and business units, including The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, the UK news operation of the holding, and the News Corp headquarters, according to an email sent by the company to its staff earlier in the day.
Unknown hackers targeted the emails and documents of some employees, including journalists. News Corp hired cybersecurity firm Mandiant Inc. to help with an investigation, the report said.
"Mandiant assesses that those behind this activity have a China nexus, and we believe they are likely involved in espionage activities to collect intelligence to benefit China’s interests," David Wong, vice president of incident response at Mandiant, said, as quoted by the newspaper.
News Corp believes the threatening activity has been contained, the report said.
The United States has repeatedly accused China of targeting US companies and government bodies. On Tuesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray said that China poses the greatest threat to the United States in the field of economic security and innovation, stealing "terabytes" of data from "hundreds" of American companies. He added that there are more than 2,000 investigations focusing on Chinese government attempts to steal US intellectual property.
Beijing has repeatedly denied cyber attack allegations.