A coast guard official was sentenced to six years and two months in prison by a Kaohsiung court yesterday for selling classified information to a Chinese national.
The Ciaotou District Court found the defendant, identified by her surname, Wu (吳), guilty of bribery-related offenses while she was working at the Southern Branch of the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) last year.
Investigators from the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office said the suspect photographed classified documents, such as drill records and reports, which were stored on a work computer.
Photo: Tsai Ching-hua, Taipei Times
She sent them to a Chinese national, identified by their surname, Wang (王), in exchange for NT$70,000 (US$2,155) of digital currency, prosecutors said.
Wu also made an agreement with Wang to gather national secrets relating to critical infrastructure and defense plans for outlying islands in exchange for NT$500,000, the prosecutors said.
From December last year, Wu used a messaging app to gather information from CGA personnel, but her attempts were unsuccessful, they said.
According to court documents, Wu was sentenced to six years and two months in prison and deprived of her civil rights for three years. The ruling can be appealed.
The court said Wu was motivated to collect and sell sensitive information, because she was in debt, adding that her actions had harmed national security.
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