Bloomberg Television12 min
How China’s Intelligence Operations Target Tech
Peter Mattis, David Gura, Christina Ruffini
Interview, Fireside Chat
- The Ministry of State Security (MSS) is expected to facilitate critical and strategic business benefiting the Chinese state by leveraging co-optees as collaborators who can be tapped when necessary.
- The Chinese Communist Party views artificial intelligence as fundamental to global competition, leading to intensified targeting of companies deemed of critical national importance to facilitate access to resources needed to lead the AI race.
- A public-private partnership in China will likely result in legitimate industry workers being unexpectedly assigned government work, with the 2017 intelligence law requiring cooperation upon presentation of legitimate credentials, leaving executives with no ability to negotiate while retaining unclassified but highly valuable access.
- Executives should anticipate the continued use of young women as honeypots to extract information, a tactic already in practice for facilitating technology transfer through human relationships.
- AI is forecast to supercharge MSS capabilities by facilitating tool development and processing massive datasets to tip off human operations, thereby sharpening tools for future espionage.
- Corporate awareness and individual personal choices are identified as the primary factors in preventing espionage, with a lack of preparation regarding red lines leaving individuals most vulnerable during potential approaches.
- High-value targets without security clearances remain at risk of being targeted for political intelligence and the ability to influence U.S. policy, in addition to classified information.
- The MSS is predicted to maintain a primary focus on the human element to drive political action and influence, operating alongside technical exploitation.
- Robust relationships between the MSS and Chinese cloud computing companies are expected to continue being leveraged to support government operations, enabling the processing of huge data volumes combined with human intelligence leads.