- China lures military, intelligence services with ‘on-demand’ jobs
- Employees are attracted through interviews and written assessments
- China brings together separate reports to form ‘complete operational picture’
China targets Western military, intelligence and government employees with “honey” job offers in order to steal secrets and gather information on government policy, as well as military strategy, capabilities and installations.
You may already be familiar with North Korea’s attempts to sneak into Western tech companies through job applications, but China has changed its strategy to attract those seeking jobs in foreign policy and defense fields.
The problem has become so serious that the FBI, alongside the Five Eyes intelligence community, issued a warning against employment scams to prevent the unintentional sharing of classified and privileged information with China.
China encourages its agents to share secrets
The warning states that Chinese intelligence agents pose as employees of private consulting firms, think tanks or human resources offering lucrative job offers through job postings on professional networking platforms, online recruitment and independent “gig job” websites such as LinkedIn, Indeed and Upwork.
Once the decoy has attracted a potential target, an interview is scheduled in which the target is questioned about their ties to government contacts, or their military roles and unit activities, as well as information about their home base or naval vessel.
Applicants who pass the interview stage will then be invited to participate in a written assessment focused on analyzing China’s bilateral relations, geopolitical issues related to the Indo-Pacific region, or broader defense and international trade issues.
If the written assessment proves promising, recruiters will attempt to probe the potential employee for more privileged information and use the excuse of switching to a “secure” encrypted messaging platform to build trust.
Once the relationship is solidified, applicants will begin receiving payments for their reports, with the FBI noting that significantly higher payments will be made for sensitive information. Payments are often routed through third-party payment platforms, such as PayPal, Payoneer, Zelle, Skrill, and Wise. Recruiters will also use Western Union, wire transfers and cryptocurrency transfers.
The strategy of Chinese intelligence officials is not to investigate sensitive information from a single source, which could arouse suspicion, but to use multiple reports from multiple candidates to build “a complete operational picture.”
But it is not only the military and intelligence services who are targeted by this scheme, as those with privileged access to government information also include academics, journalists, independent writers, employees of think tanks or anyone with ties to the defense, security, political and economic sectors.
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