Spying on the US is a service to China, state-run media said Wednesday, singing the praises of a man who confessed to hacking American defense contractors on Beijing’s behalf.
Chinese national Su Bin, 50, pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets from the companies, including plans for transport planes and fighter jets.
In a plea agreement filed Wednesday, he admitted to conspiring with two unnamed persons in China to try to acquire plans for F-22 and F-35 fighter jets and C-17 transport aircraft.
Boeing, the American airplane manufacturer, was among the companies hacked.
If he had done so, “we are willing to show our gratitude and respect for his service to our country”, said an editorial in the Global Times, a nationalistic newspaper with close ties to the ruling Communist Party.
“On the secret battlefield without gunpowder, China needs special agents to gather secrets from the US,” it added.
But it also questioned whether the plea agreement reflected the truth of the matter, saying that while the US has arrested “quite a few ‘Chinese spies’… most of them proved to be innocent”.
“As the ‘war of information’ between China and the US continues”, it said, “there will probably be more Chinese framed as spies.”
Washington and Beijing have repeatedly clashed over what the US describes as rampant cyberspying by the Chinese government on US industry.
Last year, the US indicted five Chinese military officers on charges of cyberspying.
In the 1990s, Taiwanese-American Wen Ho Lee was accused of spying for the Chinese government, but eventually pleaded guilty to only one minor charge in an embarrassing debacle that ended in an apology from then US president Bill Clinton.
Chinese-born US citizen Chi Mak was jailed for 24 years in 2008 for conspiring to smuggle sensitive US submarine technology to China.

More from AFP
- Cyberattacks Target Websites of German Airports, Admin
- Meta Slapped With 5.5 Million Euro Fine for EU Data Breach
- International Arrests Over ‘Criminal’ Crypto Exchange
- France Regulator Raps Apple Over App Store Ads
- More Political Storms for TikTok After US Government Ban
- Meta Hit With 390 Million Euro Fine Over EU Data Breaches
- Facebook Agrees to Pay $725 Million to Settle Privacy Suit
- China’s ByteDance Admits Using TikTok Data to Track Journalists
Latest News
- Meta Awards $27,000 Bounty for 2FA Bypass Vulnerability
- The Effect of Cybersecurity Layoffs on Cybersecurity Recruitment
- Critical Vulnerability Impacts Over 120 Lexmark Printers
- BIND Updates Patch High-Severity, Remotely Exploitable DoS Flaws
- Industry Reactions to Hive Ransomware Takedown: Feedback Friday
- Microsoft Urges Customers to Patch Exchange Servers
- Iranian APT Leaks Data From Saudi Arabia Government Under New Persona
- US Reiterates $10 Million Reward Offer After Disruption of Hive Ransomware
