British intelligence warns of the dangers of the theft of industrial secrets by the Chinese
China will be the main obstacle to technological innovation: this is the diagnosis of the head of the British domestic intelligence service MI5. Ken McCallum was speaking at a conference with his counterparts from the Five Eyes Alliance (American, Australian, Canadian and New Zealand intelligence). MI5 wants to alert business leaders.
Published on:
1 minute
With our correspondent in London. Emmeline Finn
” If you work in high technology, geopolitics matters to you. Even if you don’t care. » For Ken McCallum, British companies are most at risk from Chinese industrial espionage, which, according to him, is reaching significant proportions. epic “.
The British domestic intelligence agency MI5 tracked more than twenty Chinese companies that tried to obtain technological secrets from British companies and universities over the past year.
Read alsoA dispute between the United Kingdom and China over spying accusations
Amnesty International was particularly targeted
According to Ken McCallum, more and more Chinese spies are posing as consultants or recruiters on the social network LinkedIn to connect with their targets – MI5 has recorded 20,000 cases. The number of investigations related to China has increased sevenfold in four years.
The AI sector, which is fully developing around the world, is particularly concerned about the chances of political manipulation, believes the top spy in this rare speech which also refers to Iran and Russia as threats to British innovation.