Britain’s GCHQ spy agency chief yesterday was to warn Western nations of the “huge threat” from China seeking to exploit its technological dominance to control its own citizens and gain influence abroad.
GCHQ Director Jeremy Fleming was to tell a British defense studies body that the Chinese Communist Party views technologies such as satellite systems and digital currencies as a “tool to gain advantage.”
In excerpts of his speech released late on Monday, Fleming would use the annual “security lecture” at the RUSI think tank to argue that China could act in ways representing “a huge threat to us all.”
Photo: Reuters
He was to urge the UK and its allies to respond urgently.
“At GCHQ it is our privilege and duty to see the sliding door moments of history. This feels like one of those moments,” Fleming was to say. “Our future strategic technology advantage rests on what we as a community do next. I’m confident that together we can tilt that in our collective favour.”
Fleming has headed GCHQ since 2017, and has sought to bring the intelligence and security agency out of the shadows.
His comments came as China was in the process of launching its “digital yuan,” raising fears that authoritarian nations could use digital currencies to increase surveillance and control.
A centralized digital currency could “enable China to partially evade the sort of international sanctions currently being applied to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s regime in Russia,” Fleming was to say.
China has also launched a satellite navigation system, Beidou, as a rival to GPS, compelling Chinese to use it, Fleming was to say.
“Many believe that China is building a powerful anti-satellite capability, with a doctrine of denying other nations access to space in the event of a conflict,” he was to say. “And there are fears the technology could be used to track individuals.”
He was to accuse China of seeking to gain “control of the markets,” as well as “those in their sphere of influence and of their own citizens.”
Fleming was also to blame Beijing for creating “client economies and governments” by exporting technology to nations which risk “mortgaging the future” by buying in Chinese technology with “hidden costs.”
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