German intelligence "reveal fake accounts used by China to spy"

The German intelligence agency said China had set up fake accounts on LinkedIn as a front for collecting information

German intelligence has published details of social conspiracy accounts for what it said are fake accounts created by the Chinese intelligence service as fronts to gather personal information about German officials and politicians.

In an unusual move, the German intelligence service announced the names of individuals who say they are fictitious and fake organizations to warn public figures of the dangers of leaking valuable personal information through social networking sites.

"The Chinese intelligence services are active on websites such as LinkedIn and have been trying for some time to gather information and find intelligence sources in this way, including trying to obtain information about the habits, hobbies and interests of politicians," the German intelligence said.

She added that after nine months of research, more than 10,000 German citizens had received invitations to connect through the LinkedIn website for professional communication, from fake pages disguised as search pages for experiences, pages of consultants, researchers and academics.

The German intelligence service called on the users concerned to contact him if they encountered suspicious social contacts.

The warning by the German intelligence agency reflects the growing concern among European and Western intelligence services about the existence of secret Chinese activities in their country. This comes in the wake of a warning by the CIA of attempts by security services in giant economies to recruit US citizens as agents.

Source:
https://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2017-12-10/german-intelligence-warns-of-increased-chinese-cyberspying
https://apnews.com/5f15f9c016f547e4812ba6b2ee66b896
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/12/10/germany-accuses-china-setting-fake-social-media-accounts-lure/