An unexpected contact on the professional network. A proposal of work from a headhunter, probably a female agent, based in the Asian nation. The opportunity to make around £20,000 part-time writing a handful of political analyses for a firm from China containing “non-public” or privileged information. Compensation in cryptocurrency or physical money preferred.
It might appear obvious, in this scenario, that something about this approach would be amiss. However, China’s powerful intelligence agency still considers it valuable to deploy headhunters to try it – prompting MI5 to issue multiple warnings about their activity on the internet.
Large-Scale Contact Attempts on Professional Networks
Last year, the head of MI5 Ken McCallum stated Chinese agents were approaching UK citizens on LinkedIn on an unprecedented scale, at a rate of 10,000 over the previous 30-month period, attempting to obtain governmental, industrial, military and scientific secrets. However a new initiative aimed at elected officials and parliament has prompted the intelligence service to act again.
A spying warning was issued on Tuesday via the offices of Lindsay Hoyle and his Lords counterpart: a single slide after the persistent attempts of certain individuals and Amanda Qiu to reach out to Members of Parliament, peers, their staffers, economists, research organizations – anybody who might provide information.
Security Approach and Legal Changes
In the curious style of British intelligence, there was no publication of the security advice from the agency or the interior ministry. Yet the service was aware its advisory document would leak once it was emailed out to Westminster. Republishing it in the media helps the wider public better identify communications with a fraudulent purpose.
The alert has the impact of uncovering additional details from within Westminster, although that is not MI5’s primary purpose. The service wants people in public life to understand that just because exchanges on LinkedIn are less overtly risky as on other social platforms, it does not mean they are without risk.
Additionally, the internal security service believed to have been responding to a particular event in parliament, although the burst of activity does come after the embarrassing failure of the legal case of a former parliamentary aide Christopher Cash and his associate Christopher Berry on a technicality in recent months.
Both individuals had been charged of working for China – a charge they denied – but inability to successfully conclude a trial under the since replaced Official Secrets Act resulted in concerns that British democracy had been insufficiently defended.
Updated Legislation and China's Long-Term Interests
The law has now been changed, and the security briefing contains a reminder of its successor: “Individuals involved in spying operations risk significant criminal penalties under the new security law.” This constitutes a criminal offense if somebody participates in behavior that could potentially “materially assist a foreign intelligence service”.
An obvious inquiry, though, is what China has to achieve. A politician who is outside ministerial roles will have limited knowledge of sensitive information, and an associate of theirs even less. But the Chinese government is also interested in parliament: for a period, in recent years, the UK’s approach to China on issues such as Huawei or the human rights situation or alleged atrocities was being driven by parliamentarians.
Methodological Variations and Persistent Cyber Threats
In part there are cultural differences too. Authoritarian governments like Beijing's export information gathering methods and the scale of its intelligence apparatus is vast, engaging 300,000 people. A former US official, a US national cyber director under the US administration, commented it was sometimes estimated that “the Chinese have more English speakers involved in this than we [western intelligence] have personnel with language skills”.
The Chinese government is willing to cultivate contacts over the long term and sometimes even the agencies have found it difficult to differentiate legitimate relationships and espionage. “China has a minimal requirement for what information is deemed to be useful,” security minister a government official told parliamentarians on Wednesday, but a rapid shift in the political cycle may result in someone quickly marginal becomes significant.
Another way to consider the relentless efforts at secret intelligence collection is in the wider context of the geopolitical contest between China and the Western nations at a threshold below the level of direct conflict. China has stepped up its hacking efforts, with the Salt Typhoon infiltration of communications systems in 80 countries, and the Volt Typhoon breach of countless internet devices.
Beijing is involved in relentless efforts to find covert sources on UK politics via digital means because it seeks to be provocative, to display power and because it has the capability.
