Chinese Ex-Insider Sentenced to Death For Leaking State Secrets
On Wednesday, the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) released a statement regarding a former assistant engineer at a state-backed institute, who was convicted of espionage for selling state secrets over a period of half a year.
The statement alleges that the former assistant engineer, surnamed Liu, grew resentful after being passed over for promotion multiple times, and was driven to covertly copy large amounts of classified data for later blackmail and leverage.
After his resignation from the research institute, he began work at an investment firm and traded risky investments under the names of his family and friends. As his investments failed, Liu began borrowing large sums and draining his credit cards to keep afloat. Growing desperate, he reportedly decided to trade the state secrets in his possession for liquidity.
Reaching out to various agencies, Liu packaged the secrets into discrete products for sale and opened multiple financial accounts for receiving funds. Utilizing multiple SIM cards bought anonymously as well as aliases for contacting agencies, frequently swapping contact methods and using pre-arranged codes for encrypted communication, doing his utmost to prevent detection and discovery. However, it is understood that Chinese counterintelligence was able to track the communications regardless.
After an initial transaction for a disappointingly low sum, Liu decided to travel abroad to find other clients. For a period of six months, he travelled to multiple countries for the intelligence transactions and in the process reached deals with multiple agencies, further compromising Chinese state secrets. It is understood that China’s counterintelligence agencies monitored Liu’s communications and movement for an extended period before taking action.
Upon arrest and investigation, it is reported that he confessed to his crimes and was promptly convicted of espionage and illegally providing state secrets. Liu has been sentence to death, as well as being stripped of his political rights for the remainder of his life.