An unexpected contact on the professional network. An offer of work from a recruiter, most likely a female agent, operating from the Asian nation. The opportunity to earn perhaps £20,000 part-time writing a handful of political analyses for a Chinese company peppered with confidential or “insider” insights. Payment in cryptocurrency or physical money favored.
It may seem clear, in this scenario, that an element about this approach would be suspicious. However, China’s powerful intelligence agency still considers it worthwhile to deploy headhunters to try it – leading the domestic spy agency to issue multiple warnings about their activity online.
Large-Scale Approaches on Social Media
Last year, the head of MI5 Ken McCallum stated Chinese agents were approaching UK citizens on LinkedIn on an extraordinary scale, at a frequency of 10,000 over the preceding two and a half years, attempting to obtain governmental, commercial, military and scientific classified information. But a new campaign targeting elected officials and Westminster has led the intelligence service to take further action.
An espionage warning was issued on Tuesday via the offices of the Commons speaker and his Lords equivalent: a brief presentation after the persistent attempts of Shirly Shen and other operatives to contact Members of Parliament, peers, their assistants, economic experts, thinktanks – anybody who might provide information.
Intelligence Approach and Legislative Updates
In the curious style of UK security services, there was no publication of the security advice from the agency or the interior ministry. But the agency knew its briefing note would become public once it was sent electronically out to Westminster. Republishing it in the press helps the wider public more easily recognize interactions with a deceptive intent.
The alert has the impact of flushing out more information from within Westminster, though that is not the agency's main objective. The service wants people in public life to recognize that just because interactions on professional networks are not as toxic as on other social platforms, it doesn't imply they are without risk.
Nor is internal security service believed to have been responding to any specific incident in the legislature, though the recent actions occur after the awkward failure of the legal case of a former parliamentary aide an individual and his friend Christopher Berry on a legal detail earlier in the autumn.
The two had been charged of working for the foreign power – a allegation they rejected – but inability to successfully conclude a prosecution under the now repealed previous legislation led to concerns that British democracy had been left unprotected.
Revised Laws and Beijing's Strategic Interests
The law has now been changed, and the security briefing includes a note of its successor: “Those engaging in spying operations face substantial criminal penalties under the National Security Act.” It is a criminal offense if somebody engages in behavior that could potentially “materially assist a overseas spy agency”.
An obvious question, though, is what China has to achieve. A politician who is outside ministerial roles will have limited knowledge of sensitive information, and an contact of theirs less so. Yet the Chinese government is particularly focused in the legislative body: for a time, in recent years, the Britain's approach to China on matters such as the telecom firm or the Uyghur repression or alleged atrocities was being influenced by MPs.
Methodological Differences and Persistent Cyber Risks
In part there are distinct approaches too. Autocratic regimes like China’s utilize intelligence collection techniques and the size of its intelligence apparatus is vast, engaging three hundred thousand people. A former US official, a US national cyber director under the US administration, commented it was occasionally assessed that “China have more English speakers engaged in this than we [western intelligence] have English speakers”.
Beijing is willing to develop contacts over the long term and sometimes even the agencies have struggled to distinguish between genuine connections and spying. “China has a minimal requirement for what information is considered to be useful,” the minister responsible Dan Jarvis told MPs on this week, but a sudden turn in the political cycle may mean someone quickly marginal turning important.
An alternative perspective to consider the relentless activities at covert intelligence collection is in the wider context of the international competition between China and the Western nations at a threshold below the level of outright war. The nation has increased its hacking efforts, with the Salt Typhoon penetration of phone and data networks in 80 countries, and the Volt Typhoon compromise of millions internet devices.
Beijing is engaged in persistent attempts to identify covert sources on UK politics via digital means because it wants to be provocative, to demonstrate influence and because it can.
