Foreign intelligence agencies are allegedly recruiting ordinary Chinese citizens to collect information, according to China National Radio. (Photo : www.wired.com)
Foreign intelligence agencies are now trying to get Chinese citizens to provide them with national secrets, as revealed in the stories of those arrested for espionage cases.
The Global Times reported that ordinary people rather than those in high-ranking positions are the targets of spies and they use the same methods of persuasion, which are cash and emotional manipulation.
The report said that the common targets of spies include college students, teachers, retired soldiers, military enthusiasts, and employees of companies and government bodies whose work relates to national defense.
According to the China National Radio (CNR), the possible sources of leaks include people who handle confidential information at work, as well as scholars and experts who are involved in major scientific projects or working as consultants for senior decision-making bodies and those who do not use encryption to protect confidential documents.
Under China's Criminal Law, anyone who steals, spies on, or unlawfully passes on state secrets or intelligence to overseas agencies may face punishments up to the death penalty.
According to a survey from the Internal and Judicial Affairs Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, in May 2014 more than 70 percent of leaked information classified as national secrets was passed on via the Internet.
The CNR report said that top secret information was unknowingly leaked by friends or relatives working in crucial sectors to their military enthusiasts by bragging about their knowledge online, while some hobbyists took pictures of military sites and posted them online simply to drive traffic to their pages.
The report said that some spy agencies posted ads for part-time jobs such as "information collector" on online forums, job-seeking websites or social media platforms, targeting people who live close to companies related to national security or government offices. People with military backgrounds or former employees of companies that deal with sensitive data are also targets of these kinds of advertisements.
Four employees of unnamed state-owned defense companies who were suspected of leaking sensitive information to overseas spy agencies were arrested by local public security officers in Sichuan Province in July, Chengdu-based West China City Daily reported.
The report said that one of the suspects surnamed Wen was allegedly offered to collect information for a monthly salary of 3,200 yuan ($512), and another person surnamed Wu, who had been working at a defense company for over 10 years, was allegedly offered 1.2 million yuan a year to share information.
Wang Guoxiang, an associate professor at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, previously told the Global Times that some people were enticed into these activities by money, and for other reasons, such as revenge for unfulfilled political or economic aspirations.
Wang also reminded people that when taking photographs of military airports, warships and airplanes, they must remove geographic and other sensitive information as this might be used by spy agencies.
According to China's Counter-Espionage Law promulgated and enacted in Nov. 2014, those who unwittingly leak sensitive information and have not seriously jeopardized national security will not be held accountable, provided they make a full confession.
