Chinese vendor jailed for giving railway data to foreigners: State Security Ministry – Technologist

It said an unnamed Chinese information technology company received a commercial contract in late 2020 to collect electronic signal data along China’s vast railway networks from a foreign company that said it had been a market researcher before entering China’s railway market to provide technical support services.

The foreign company, which could not send its personnel to China because of Beijing’s Covid restrictions, outsourced the work to Chinese vendors, the ministry said. It added that it found out the foreign company had many customers, including foreign intelligence agencies, defence and military units and government departments.

It said the Chinese company was aware that the foreign company might have “ulterior motives” but, enticed by a lucrative contract, it went ahead to buy and install equipment according to the foreign party’s contract requirements, collected data at fixed locations and conducted mobile testing and data collection in multiple cities and at high-speed rail lines as specified by the foreign client.

The ministry said the project collected 500 gigabytes of data in one month, including signals from Internet of Things transmissions, cellular and railway communications and confidential networks.