MOSCOW: An alleged Chinese intelligence officer was using fake profiles on the LinkedIn professional networking site for five years to lure classified information from British officials in exchange for money or other lucrative offers, reported Sputnik.
Sources told The Times newspaper that the spy under the nickname Robin Zhang created accounts pretending they are made by an employee of real companies or used pages of fake companies to contact thousands of United Kingdom’s civil servants, scientist and security officials as their representative to collect vast amounts of classified or sensitive data offering at least US$10,000 for it. In some cases, he offered his targets fully paid trips to China and participation in lucrative conferences.
Western security services believe this Chinese operative is the most prolific spy working against British interests in a generation, according to the report.
The newspaper alleged that Zhang still uses different aliases to obtain secret information, although many of his profiles were deleted after LinkedIn began cracking down on fake accounts.
Parliament’s intelligence watchdog warned that Chinese spies are ‘prolifically and aggressively’ targeting the UK.
Last month, the Intelligence and Security Committee of UK Parliament said in its report that Chinese intelligence agencies have been targeting the UK “prolifically and aggressively,” which poses a “challenge” for the national intelligence community. – BERNAMA-SPUTNIK
