The crime of espionage once conjured images of dark street corners, fedora-wearing spies and government agents who stayed in the shadows, rarely seeing the inside of a public courtroom.
These days, the game has changed. The same agents are now looking for different kinds of spies, ones who increasingly threaten corporate America — while they’re working within it.
The crime is called economic espionage and it has catapulted to one of the top federal law enforcement priorities in the country.
It often involves American-based employees who burrow into company computer systems, steal prized trade secrets and hand over the information to overseas competitors for tens of thousands — even millions — of dollars.
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We know in general about hacking and cyber-espionage that comes out of China and, to a lesser extent, Russia. But rarely have U.S. intelligence agencies so bluntly and publicly pointed the finger directly at those countries’ governments.
A report presented to Congress Thursday accuses them of targeting, over the past three years, “a broad array of U.S. government agencies, private companies, universities and other institutions – all holding large volumes of sensitive economic information.”
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Beijing on Friday hit out at a US intelligence agency report accusing the Chinese of extensive cyber spying, saying it was unprofessional and irresponsible.
The unusually blunt report on foreign cyber spying submitted to the US Congress on Thursday said the Chinese were the world’s “most active and persistent perpetrators” of economic espionage.
“Cyber attacks are transnational and anonymous,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters.
“Without investigation, to prejudge the origin of the attack is neither professional nor responsible.”
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Two private investigators have been charged in federal court in connection with a Hewlett-Packard spying scandal in which they allegedly used false identities to obtain the phone records of board members, employees and journalists, court records show.
Matthew DePante and his father, Joseph DePante, were charged in U.S. District Court in San Jose on Thursday with conspiracy to commit Social Security fraud, the latest development in a corporate spying scandal that ruptured the reputation of one of Silicon Valley’s most revered companies.
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ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Pakistani officials on Monday rejected a German newspaper report that the country’s secret service spied on German security forces in Afghanistan.
Without citing its sources, mass-selling weekly Bild am Sonntag reported on Sunday that Germany’s BND foreign intelligence agency warned its interior ministry that Pakistan had spied on 180 German police officers deployed in Afghanistan to train locals.
A Pakistani foreign ministry official, who asked not to be identified, described the report as “ridiculous” and “useless”. Pakistan military spokesman Major-General Athar Abbas said the report was not worth commenting on.
Bild am Sonntag said private telephone calls, messages to the German interior ministry, military mission orders and lists of police officer names had been intercepted, raising fears sensitive information could end up in the hands of the Taliban.
The United States has long suspected Pakistan, or elements within the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), of supporting militant groups in order to increase its influence in Afghanistan, particularly after NATO troops leave in 2014.
Islamabad has come under particularly intense pressure to fight militancy since U.S. special forces killed Osama bin Laden in May in a Pakistani town, where he had apparently been living for years.
Admiral Mike Mullen said before retiring as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff last month that a militant group that had attacked U.S. targets in Afghanistan was a “veritable arm” of Pakistani intelligence.
The German interior ministry told Reuters the BND suspected a German email had been intercepted but could not give confirmation. The ministry added it was not aware of any comprehensive interception of German police data.
The BND declined to comment on the report.
Pakistan says it has sacrificed more than any other country that joined the U.S. war on terror after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
(Reporting by Zeeshan Haider; Editing by Sugita Katyal)
