In an accusal similar to others that have appeared recently in the news, U.S. Senator Sam Brownback has condemned the Communist Chinese government's plans to spy on hotel guests during the Olympic Games.
Senator claims China wants to spy on visitors during the summer games (IMG:BOCOG)
"The Chinese government has put in place a system to spy on and gather information about every guest at hotels where Olympic visitors are staying," said Brownback. "This means journalists, athletes' families and other visitors will be subjected to invasive intelligence gathering by the Chinese Public Security Bureau."
According to reports, prior to being chosen to host the Olympic Games, China is said to have pledged to provide open access to information, and to allow journalists to write freely during the Games.
However, Brownback says that, in advance of the Olympics, foreign-owned hotels in China were "ordered to install monitoring equipment on their network," allowing the Chinese Public Security Bureau (PSB) to monitor the electronic information processed by thousands of international visitors staying in these hotels.
"I am very disappointed that the Chinese government will not follow through on its promise to the International Olympic Committee to maintain an environment free of government censorship during the Games," added the senator.
The Chinese government has demanded that hotels allow the PSB to install a software program and hardware device and to adhere to a series of regulations designed to assist the PSB to spy on the Internet activities of guests and collect records of their online activity.
The interesting aspect is the apparent confirmation of the order to install monitoring equipment, which has seen several international hotel chains confirming the order's existence.
Brownback's office said in a statement that it has received a copy of the order from separate hotel companies, translated from the original Chinese. The text alludes to harsh punishment for failure to comply.
"The hotels have asked us to preserve their anonymity; in order to protect their safety, and in return for their courage in coming forward, I cannot divulge their identities," outlined Brownback. "These hotels are justifiably outraged. On the other hand, these hotel chains have invested millions of dollars in their Chinese properties, and while they wish to find a way to reverse this order, if they are specifically identified, they could face severe retaliation by the Communist government."
There have always been whispers of 'Big Red' watching and snooping on the U.S., and this isn’t the first time Brownback has taken aim at China. In May, Brownback accused the Chinese government of exerting pressure on U.S.-owned hotels to install Internet filtration systems that will censor online content during the upcoming games.
Interestingly, at that time, Brownback was giving a news conference in which he called on President Bush to boycott the Olympic opening ceremony in a stand against China’s poor record on human rights.
In June, Rep. Frank Wolf and Rep. Christopher H. Smith claimed that six computers were compromised by Chinese hackers from a period of 2006 to 2007. Wolf and Smith, both critical of Beijing's human-rights policy, claimed that the hacked computers held information on political dissidents from around the world.
Wolf also claimed that four of his computers were cracked starting in 2006, and Smith said two of his computers were compromised in December of 2006 and March of 2007.
Wolf was apparently discouraged from reporting the incidents.
"The problem has been that no one wants to talk about this issue," he said according to the Associated Press. "Every time I've started to do something I've been told 'You can't do this.' A lot of people have made it very, very difficult."
Wolf was reportedly told by the FBI that computers of other House members were accessed by sources in China as well.
The one fact that deals with computer security and China is that it is consistently in the top three places around the world where most Malware originates. If you want to follow a story that conspiracy lovers are sure to enjoy, there is likely to be plenty of political coverage left on this one.
There are currently no comments for this article. Be the first to comment! (no registration required)
Advertising
There are currently no comments for this article. Be the first to comment! (no registration required)