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How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

economist.com

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Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#22
post #4

Soon enough anything that is even remotely a security threat (pretty much any non-trivial app) will require clearance and in office work. The North Korean hacks into several companies are an example of how bad it is now, add in some good deep fake technology and soon you will not be able to distinguish who is actually working for your company.

Hiring and administrative machinery will therefore obviously be the target for an intelligent adversary, which we should presume we are facing.

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#24
post #17
post #4

Soon enough anything that is even remotely a security threat (pretty much any non-trivial app) will require clearance and in office work. The North Korean hacks into several companies are an example of how bad it is now, add in some good deep fake technology and soon you will not be able to distinguish who is actually working for your company.

How does it work in US, you just look at the guy and then he sends you his IBAN? Aren’t companies required to establish an employee’s origin by bureaucratic means? IDs, SSNs, notarized copies, work permit, etc? Why are North Korean guys even a problem, it feels like they shouldn’t be able to fake identification numbers and permits, unless something is fundamentally wrong with the country’s accounting.

Indeed there is such a thing, it's the I-9 document check and is required for all new employees.

The problem is that identity theft is so ridiculously easily in the US that it's trivial for bad actors to just steal someone's identity. The solution is to fix identity theft.

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#25
post #4

Soon enough anything that is even remotely a security threat (pretty much any non-trivial app) will require clearance and in office work. The North Korean hacks into several companies are an example of how bad it is now, add in some good deep fake technology and soon you will not be able to distinguish who is actually working for your company.

> Soon enough anything that is even remotely a security threat [...] will require clearance and in office work. I think this is one of those things that sucks but may be necessary. You need to trust the knowledge workers that make up your economy to not send your research to a hostile nation so they can take advantage of your R&D investments. And you need to know that your critical infrastructure (beyond Internet and…

> You need to trust the knowledge workers

unfortunately among many circles, it is the opposite. More and more "zero trust" .. more logging and audit, more spot checks, more re-logins .. It is a culture clash, always-on networking has made it much worse, since security professionals have endless lists of problems they see.

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#26

Is this... not a normal practice for all intelligence services of the world? Emigrants always have ties to the originland.

> Emigrants always have ties to the originland.

China can coerce it's diaspora through their family ties and social circle back home[1]. That isn't normal and is very difficult to pull off in democratic countries.

1. https://www.propublica.org/article/operation-fox-hunt-how-ch...

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#27

Is this... not a normal practice for all intelligence services of the world? Emigrants always have ties to the originland.

I've read about this diaspora espionage from roughly a dozen countries. Not sure all countries are engaged but quite a few countries are.

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#29
post #17
post #4

Soon enough anything that is even remotely a security threat (pretty much any non-trivial app) will require clearance and in office work. The North Korean hacks into several companies are an example of how bad it is now, add in some good deep fake technology and soon you will not be able to distinguish who is actually working for your company.

How does it work in US, you just look at the guy and then he sends you his IBAN? Aren’t companies required to establish an employee’s origin by bureaucratic means? IDs, SSNs, notarized copies, work permit, etc? Why are North Korean guys even a problem, it feels like they shouldn’t be able to fake identification numbers and permits, unless something is fundamentally wrong with the country’s accounting.

Experian was hacked and 168 million Americans had all of lives information stolen - the data that is supposed to verify who I am and tracks all of my financial life, everywhere I've ever lived and of course my social security number.

Not one thing to fix this was done. Anyone could buy my information and be me, NOTHING was done to fix this insanely huge problem.

Re: How China turns members of its diaspora into spies

#30

[flagged]

There are two as it happens - the other one is Eastern Russia - ethnically asian, although not Han. Notice how Putin is always present for the pacific exercises, even when one might think he had better ways to spend his time on the western front.
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