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Chinese Espionage and Night Vision

By Press

From ThreatsWatch.org, a story on Chinese espionage in sensitive U.S. defense industries:

The author says that the threat posed by China goes beyond their reported involvement in the recent cyber attacks against Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

According to the story, "the aggressive Chinese economic espionage effort mounted by Chinese intelligence agencies is illustrated by the announcement by U.S. Attorney Scott N. Schools in the Northern District of California earlier this week that Philip Cheng had been sentenced to two years in prison and fined $50,000 for his part in brokering the illegal export of a night vision camera and its accompanying technology to China."

Cheng had pleaded guilty on October 31 to charges that without authorization from the Department of State for selling the Panther series infra-red camera. Indicted along with Cheng was the owner of Night Vision Technology of Cupertino California, Martin Shih who died after the indictment. Shih?s company designed and made military-application devices that use infrared technology to enhance night vision. Cheng established a separate technology-transfer company with the intention of producing the camera in China, court records show.

Full post as published by Womble Trade Secrets Blog on December 11, 2007 (boomark / email).