As the U.S. begins trade talks with China, all of the focus is on tariffs and the economic relationship between the countries. But deeper unresolved issues with China remain, namely espionage. A recent student report at Stanford University uncovered a group of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) agents who were posing as Stanford students to gain access to sensitive research material and other data.
Stanford says they are reaching out to law enforcement about the report and will take appropriate action, but they are not the only school facing this issue. College campuses have long been a ripe target for Chinese spying. A report last year found that China is funding tech research at U.S. schools, one of many ways the CCP is infiltrating American institutions. "This is going on every place where there is valuable intellectual property for China to steal," says Gordon Chang, author and China expert with the Gatestone Institute. "So this has been going on for decades, we've known about it, we know how the Chinese do it...so this is really on us."
Chang tells KTRH that U.S. leaders in both political parties have been too lax in allowing this type of spying to go on for far too long. "We know that Chinese consular officials have been coercing Chinese students to steal data, and we know that Chinese Ministry of State security agents in our country have been doing the same thing," he says. "We can get these agents and diplomats off of our soil."
"We need to impose costs on China for doing this," Chang continues. "We haven't been doing this, but it's now on us to stop it...because we have the means to stop it. And this is, after all, our country."
Photo: Getty Images AsiaPac