China is listening BIGSTOCK

Don’t underestimate Chinese intelligence agencies

We have seen countless movies where the intelligence agencies save countries from peril. Such a picture, from a broader perspective, is not wrong, but to let people believe that certain agencies are special and the others do not certainly seem to be.

The idea of being an agent is that no one will know about your mission, unless the agent was double spied by another agent. They are the people relentlessly working hard to get the right information for the country. Through newspapers, movies, and other forms of media -- we all know about the espionage of MI5 and MI6, CIA, ISI, RAW etc.

But we don’t know much about Chinese intelligence agencies. They have been hidden lions for decades, and have maintained a low profile, which I believe is the definition of true intelligence. Have we ever asked question about how they function? Probably not, and who cares, right? They don’t appear on television.

For long, the international agencies have overlooked the Chinese espionage attempts, for which the US is paying billions annually. The most interesting part is they don’t have a fancy name, and hide under the banners of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China and Central Military Commissions. Both of these departments are answerable to the president of China directly.

Chinese intelligence has different segments from foreign to national departments for espionage and information gatherings. Chinese intelligence mainly gathers information for maintaining state power and international policy goals. Their intelligence service mainly focuses on industrial espionage to gather information to bolster their economy.

They also have widespread interests abroad, especially the West, to maintain Chinese influence in the region. FBI Director Christopher Wray has shown concern regarding Chinese intelligence, and has warned US intelligence officials that China’s global ambition to become the world superpower, in unconventional ways, can be a threat to the US.

Trend Micro, the world’s largest security company, blamed “Lucky Cat,” the Chinese hacker as responsible for being involved in a cyber-espionage mission targeting Japan, India, and Tibet. After investigating, it was discovered that a person name Gu Kaiyun was responsible for several hacking attempts overseas. Later, it was found that Gu Kaiyun was writing a Master’s thesis on cyber hacking in the University of Chengdu.

The Belgian Minister Jo Vanduerzen has also accused the Chinese government for spying against the Belgian government. They were suspecting that this attempt took place to get hold of information regarding NATO and the European Union. The US and Europe also have theories that China sends its students abroad for studies, and then they spy on important locations around the country.

One of the blatant allegations made by Washington was that the Chinese were attempting to spy at the Capella Hotel, where Kim Jong-un and President Donald Trump were meeting. The Chinese supposedly set up people, from the waiters to officials of the hotel, to try to observe details of the meeting -- the Americans were somehow vigilant during the meeting, taking all the appropriate measures to counter Chinese espionage.

It is not possible at the moment to deter Chinese spies in the US. There are more than a million Chinese students in the country contributing billions of dollars to the economy. However, the US can increase their surveillance on all the students currently staying in the country.

The US is probably the biggest victim of Chinese espionage, and has been harmed in many ways regarding their industrial and military secrets. An American citizen of Chinese descent, Dongfan Chung, was suspected to pass secret information regarding the B-1 bomber, the C-17 military cargo plane, the F-15 fighter jet, and Chinook helicopters and other hardware military information to China, for which he was apprehended and given 15 years in prison.

It is not too hard to envisage that if the Chinese intelligence can penetrate secured systems of the world’s most developed countries, they can have access to everything, all over the world. It seems that the Chinese government is hungry to develop their nation by any means. Their agency and agenda are strictly based on economic development and supremacy.

American researchers have confirmed that most of the people linked with espionage were not very experienced. The Chinese influence will be unimaginable when these agents become experienced, and conduct tougher missions.

Yead Mahmood is a geopolitical analyst and lawyer.