Tag: Espionage and Intelligence Services

F.B.I. Arrests Two on Charges Tied to Chinese Police Outpost in NYC

Chin@Strategy

For years, thousands of New Yorkers and tourists have walked past an unassuming office building in Lower Manhattan. On Monday, federal prosecutors unsealed criminal charges accusing two men of helping run an unauthorized Chinese police outpost there, one of more than 100 around the globe used to intimidate and control China’s citizens abroad, and to stamp out criticism of the ruling Communist Party. The two men were arrested on Monday and charged with conspiring to act as agents of the Chinese government, and with obstructing justice. They are said to…

The Sunday Read: ‘The Daring Ruse That Exposed China’s Campaign to Steal American Secrets’

Chin@Strategy

In March 2017, an engineer at G.E. Aviation in Cincinnati received a request on LinkedIn. The engineer, Hua, is in his 40s, tall and athletic, with a boyish face that makes him look a decade younger. He moved to the United States from China in 2003 for graduate studies in structural engineering. The LinkedIn request came from Chen Feng, a school official at the Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, in eastern China. Days later, Chen sent him an email inviting him to the university to give a research presentation.…

Lonely Cry for Action as China Locks Up Japanese Citizens on Spy Charges

Chin@Strategy

Hideji Suzuki served six years in a Chinese prison on spying charges — a sentence that stemmed, he said, from a dinner party where he did nothing more than try to make small talk with a Chinese academic about North Korea. Since returning to Japan in October, he has tried to raise the alarm about China’s seemingly arbitrary detentions of Japanese citizens. He is one of 17 Japanese nationals detained on similar charges since 2015, but the only one to speak out about his experience and what he describes as…

Pulling the Plug on TikTok Will Be Harder Than It Looks

Chin@Strategy

In the summer of 2020, in full re-election mode and looking for new ways to punish China, President Donald J. Trump threatened to cut off TikTok from the phones of millions of Americans unless its parent company agreed to sell all of its U.S. operations to American owners. The effort collapsed. Now, more than two years later, after lengthy studies of how Chinese authorities could use the app for everything from surveillance to information operations, the Biden administration is attempting a strikingly similar move. It is better organized, vetted by…

Claims of Chinese Election Meddling Put Trudeau on Defensive

Chin@Strategy

OTTAWA — The leaked intelligence reports have set off a political firestorm. They describe plans by the government of China and its diplomats in Canada to ensure that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party took power in the last two elections, raising troubling questions about the integrity of Canada’s democracy. But as two prominent Canadian news organizations have published a series of leaks over the past month, Mr. Trudeau has refused calls to launch a public inquiry into the matter, angering political opponents and leading to accusations that he is…

Justice Dept. Investigating TikTok’s Owner Over Possible Spying on Journalists

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department is investigating the surveillance of American citizens, including several journalists who cover the tech industry, by the Chinese company that owns TikTok, according to three people familiar with the matter. The investigation, which began late last year, appears to be tied to the admission in December by the company, ByteDance, that its employees had inappropriately obtained the data of American TikTok users, including that of two reporters and a few of their associates. The department’s criminal division, the F.B.I. and the U.S. attorney for the…

U.S. Intelligence Agencies Warn of China’s Efforts to Expand Its Power

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WASHINGTON — China’s government is increasingly convinced it can only make itself the pre-eminent power in Asia, and a major power globally, by diminishing American influence, the top U.S. intelligence official said Wednesday. The goal of weakening U.S. power and influence is one reason China has continued to pursue a deepening partnership with Russia, according to an annual intelligence threat assessment that was also released Wednesday. Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence who appeared before a Senate committee to present the threat assessment, said China believes it can…

Hearing on Covid’s Origins Promises Politics Mixed With Substance

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — House Republicans on Wednesday will dig into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic in a hearing that promises to be filled with political theater alongside substantive questions about laboratory safety and what, if anything, could have been done to prevent the worst public health crisis in a century. The hearing of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic is expected to focus largely on the intensifying debate over whether Covid-19 was the result of a laboratory leak. In advance of the session, Republicans issued a memorandum critical of…

Where Did Covid Originate? Here’s What We Know and Don’t Know

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The Energy Department’s conclusion, with “low confidence,” that an accidental laboratory leak in China most likely caused the coronavirus pandemic has renewed questions about what sparked the worst public health crisis in a century — and whether the virus at the heart of it was somehow connected to scientific research. Scientists and spy agencies have tried assiduously to answer that question, but conclusive evidence is hard to come by. The nation’s intelligence agencies are split, and none of them changed their conclusions after seeing the Energy Department’s findings, officials…

China Dismisses Latest Claim That Lab Leak Likely Caused Covid

Chin@Strategy

China accused the United States of politicizing the coronavirus pandemic again on Monday, in response to reports that the Energy Department had concluded that an accidental laboratory leak had likely triggered the spread of Covid worldwide. The rebuke marks the latest salvo in a running war of words between the two countries over the origins of the virus, an issue that has taken on as much of a political dimension as a scientific one as the rivalry between the two superpowers deepens. “Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should…