Chinese Corporate Spies At Dow, Motorola, Ford, DuPont, Boeing -- The List Goes On

Story worth noting in today's NYT about how the Chinese government is recruiting spies within major U.S. industrial companies.

One example given is at Dow, where an Indiana-based Dow Chemical researcher "began sharing Dow's secrets with Chinese researchers, authorities say, then obtained grants from a state-run foundation in China with the goal of starting a rival business there."

According to the story, this type of espionage-oriented arrangement between Chinese government-run companies and Chinese-born United States citizens is far from unique. The authors note a number of similar examples:

Economic espionage charges are also pending against Jin Hanjuan, a software engineer for Motorola, who was arrested with a laptop full of company documents while boarding a plane for China, prosecutors said. Over the last year, other charges involving the theft of trade secrets a charge less serious than espionage have been filed against former engineers from General Motors and Ford who had business ties to China. And scientists at the DuPont Company and Valspar, a Minnesota paint company, recently pleaded guilty to stealing their employer's secrets after taking jobs in China.

The story also notes that "a retired Boeing engineer was convicted after a search of his home found documents on United States military and space programs, as well as letters from Chinese aviation officials seeking the data."

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