Spies recruited online jailed for stealing secrets
Print Edition
Two men have been jailed for selling military secrets to unidentified foreign intelligence agencies, the latest in a series of cases where people were persuaded to become spies via the Internet.
One of the men, surnamed Zhang, had taken 500 pictures of the country’s first aircraft carrier after he was contacted online by someone claiming to be a magazine editor, according to Dalian Television.
He was detained by police in the northeastern port of Dalian where the Liaoning — a Soviet-era vessel bought from Ukraine and refitted before going into service in 2012 — undergoes regular maintenance.
Zhang had taken pictures of the vessel from April to August before authorities caught up with him, the TV report said.
He is believed to have been paid about 50,000 yuan (US$7,984).
The other man, surnamed Han, who was also detained in Dalian, was paid 90,000 yuan for pictures of Chinese military equipment after a “reporter” contacted him online, according to yesterday’s Dalian Evening News.
But the reporter was “actually a foreign spy who was being monitored for some time by intelligence agencies,” the newspaper said.
Han has been sentenced to eight years behind bars. Zhang was jailed for six years. Both were convicted of stealing state secrets.
The Intermediate People’s Court in Dalian heard that Zhang, 23, had been contacted via an online chat service in April last year by someone claiming to be the editor of an overseas magazine who asked him to take pictures of the carrier. Zhang even took a job in a military project to make more money. He was found to have taken more than 500 pictures of the Liaoning and another 200 pictures related to military secrets, the newspaper said.
Han, 30, said a Wechat user befriended him in March last year after he had posted his resume to look for a job. The user claimed to be a reporter who needed photographs of military facilities.
At his request, Han got a job in a company that gave him access to military areas, where he took hundreds of pictures.
Both men told the court that they were deeply sorry for their actions.
In May last year, security authorities in China said that a foreign spy agency had recruited around 30 university students to provide military secrets since 2012.
It had mainly targeted students in aeronautics and maritime studies, and had made contact with them via social media platforms or employment websites.
In the same month, a Chinese snack bar owner from the southern province of Guangdong was sent to prison for 10 years for disclosing military secrets, including passing on documents and photographs, to foreign intelligence agencies.
Last November, a man was arrested in the coastal city of Qingdao for selling pictures of military equipment to someone said to be a foreign spy.
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