The top spy catcher of the United States has announced that Chinese intelligence agencies are using fake LinkedIn accounts for the purpose of recruiting Americans with access to government and commercial secrets. They have stated that the company should shut them down.
The U.S. counter-intelligence chief, William Evanina has accused China of using fake LinkedIn accounts to carry out the “super aggressive” spy campaign. He told that the Chinese campaign includes contacting thousands of LinkedIn members at a time. However, he refused to tell the number of fake accounts U.S. intelligence had discovered, the number of Americans may have been contacted and also the number of success China has had in the recruitment drive.
“I recently saw that Twitter is cancelling, I don’t know, millions of fake accounts, and our request would be maybe LinkedIn could go ahead and be part of that,” Evanina, who runs the U.S. National Counter-Intelligence and Security Center stated.
Last month, LinkedIn said it took down fewer than 40 fake accounts. German and British authorities have ealier warned their citizens that Beijing is using LinkedIn to try to recruit them as spies.
But this is the first time any U.S. official has discussed the challenge in the United States in public and indicated it is a bigger problem than previously known.