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INVESTIGATION: Uncovering Chinese Academic Espionage at Stanford
The Stanford Review ^ | May 8, 2025 | Staff

Posted on 05/09/2025 12:20:21 PM PDT by Twotone

This summer, a CCP agent impersonated a Stanford student. Under the alias Charles Chen, he approached several students through social media. Anna*, a Stanford student conducting sensitive research on China, began receiving unexpected messages from Charles Chen. At first, Charles's outreach seemed benign: he asked about networking opportunities. But soon, his messages took a strange turn.

Charles inquired whether Anna spoke Mandarin, then grew increasingly persistent and personal. He sent videos of Americans who had gained fame in China, encouraged Anna to visit Beijing, and offered to cover her travel expenses. He would send screenshots of a bank account balance to prove he could buy the plane tickets. Alarmingly, he referenced details about her that Anna had never disclosed to him.

He advised her to enter China for only 24 to 144 hours, short enough, he said, to avoid visa scrutiny by authorities, and urged her to communicate exclusively via the Chinese version of WeChat, a platform heavily monitored by the CCP. When Charles commented on one of her social media posts, asking her to delete screenshots of their conversations, she knew this was serious.

Under the guidance of experts familiar with espionage tactics, Anna contacted authorities. Their investigation revealed that Charles Chen had no affiliation with Stanford. Instead, he had posed as a Stanford student for years, slightly altering his name and persona online, targeting multiple students, nearly all of them women researching China-related topics. According to the experts on China who assisted Anna, Charles Chen was likely an agent of the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS), tasked with identifying sympathetic Stanford students and gathering intelligence.

(Excerpt) Read more at stanfordreview.org ...


TOPICS: China; Crime/Corruption; News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: charleschen; chicoms; china; espionage; infiltration; mss; spies; spooks; stanford; stanfordu

1 posted on 05/09/2025 12:20:21 PM PDT by Twotone
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To: Twotone
Related article
2 posted on 05/09/2025 12:27:19 PM PDT by Carry_Okie (The tree of liberty needs a rope.)
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To: Twotone

It’s happening everywhere.

Why does the United States allow 340,000 Chinese exchange students into the country?


3 posted on 05/09/2025 12:28:26 PM PDT by BrexitBen
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To: BrexitBen

Why does the United States allow 340,000 Chinese exchange students into the country?


$$$$$$$


4 posted on 05/09/2025 12:29:20 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: Twotone

Are these Fang Fang’s friends?


5 posted on 05/09/2025 12:29:27 PM PDT by BuchananBrigadeTrumpFan (If in doubt, it's probably sarcasm)
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To: dfwgator

Tariff those dollars.


6 posted on 05/09/2025 12:33:47 PM PDT by Lisbon1940 (Don’t want to hurt no kangaroos )
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To: Twotone

Give our left sufficient time to sh*t upon STEM departments as much as they have on the marshmallow areas. Pretty soon, the Chicoms won’t bother, because STEM standards will be right down there in the sewer with the Studies types. And, we’ll all be believing that the earth is flat, the climate is changing due to SUVs, and 2+2= for large values of 2 as 2 approaches 3.


7 posted on 05/09/2025 12:37:42 PM PDT by Da Coyote
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To: Da Coyote

I think it’s already starting.


8 posted on 05/09/2025 12:39:21 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: Twotone

Enough already with the commie bastards. No more students, no more visas and no more trade until they pay us back the billions in copyright infringements and weapon technology theft.


9 posted on 05/09/2025 12:39:56 PM PDT by Kahuna
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To: BrexitBen

Why does the United States allow 340,000 Chinese exchange students into the country?

~~~

It may or may not matter if they vet exchange students.

If I read the article exerpt right, he wasn’t even a student, just a CCP agent posing as a student.


10 posted on 05/09/2025 12:43:41 PM PDT by z3n (Kakistocracy)
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To: Twotone
He sent videos of Americans who had gained fame in China,

I don't think one really exists.

11 posted on 05/09/2025 12:45:42 PM PDT by PGR88
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To: All

Any PRC citizens who gets a visa is required by PRC law to conduct some level of espionage. It could merely be open-source reporting, spot people who could be recruited or look opportunities to target or find a way to get in or near classified work.


12 posted on 05/09/2025 12:56:58 PM PDT by Reily
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To: dfwgator

Stanford back in the 1980s was ground zero for the Chinese infiltration and co-opting of our academic and high technology institutions


13 posted on 05/09/2025 1:00:32 PM PDT by rdcbn1 (TV )
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To: Twotone

Stanford was also involved in the election and Russia hoax shenanigans.


14 posted on 05/09/2025 2:11:30 PM PDT by piasa (Attitude adjustmilents offered here free of charge)
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