Posted on 08/20/2014 1:41:58 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A number of "espionage" activities have been reported in China recently, including a Canadian missionary couple who were investigated by the bureau of state security in Dandong in Liaoning province on the border with North Korea; a college graduate in Harbin in Heilongjiang province investigated for collecting confidential information for "offshore intelligence operatives," and a Guangdong citizen surnamed Li who was given 10 years in prison for having college students collect confidential military information in return for rewards ranging from several hundred to thousands of yuan per item, before passing the information to foreign intelligence units.
The high-profile publicity these cases has been granted is almost unprecedented, according to local media. Unnamed sources said the internet has facilitated intelligence gathering by foreign spies, who constantly search local websites for useful information.
The reports appear to be a pretext for a further chilling of online discussion, especially where the country's military capabilities are concerned.
Hong Yuan, scholar at the Institute of American Studies at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said that with their expertise, foreign spies can discern useful information online before transforming such information into valuable intelligence via deduction and inference, adding that "people must be on high alert to protect national secrets online."
One tactic that was cited in reports was that of foreign elements making provocative remarks online, such as references to the "incompetent combat strength of some Chinese troops" or "poor performance of some weapons" in the hope of soliciting responses from which they can extract useful intelligence.
Some (again, unnamed) foreign intelligence unit claimed that its nation collects 80% of its intelligence from public information, 50% of which is available online, according to the Guangzhou-based News
Week. Figures from China's Ministry of State Security show that 60% of foreign spies detained admitted that they gathered key intelligence from internet communities. The internet has become a critical realm for espionage and counter-espionage, according to Hong Yuan.
The Communist Party's Central Military Commission revised the "statute for intelligence protection of the People's Liberation Army" effective from May 2011 in order to crack down on online espionage regarding military intelligence.
Where is the “code machine” in this pix? Looks like an old Zenith Trans-Oceanic radio (great radios BTW).
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