MI5 names two people in alert to MPs and peers about Chinese espionage

Original article by Dan Sabbagh Defence and security editor

MI5 has issued an espionage alert to MPs and peers warning that two people linked to the Chinese intelligence service are actively seeking to recruit parliamentarians.

The two people, who operate as headhunters on the LinkedIn professional networking website aiming to obtain “non-public and insider insights”, MI5 said, are also targeting economists, thinktank staff and civil servants for their access to politicians.

MI5 named them as Amanda Qiu, from BR-YR Executive Search, and Shirly Shen, who is linked to Internship Union, and told MPs and peers they were using LinkedIn to “conduct outreach at scale”.

The spy agency sent its warning to the speaker of the Commons, Lindsay Hoyle, and his Lords equivalent, John McFall, on Tuesday morning, both of whom relayed its contents to the members of their houses with a cover message.

In his email to peers, McFall said the individuals, linked to China’s ministry of state security spy agency (MSS), were “actively reaching out to individuals in our community”.

Their “aim is to collect information and lay the groundwork for long-term relationships, using professional networking sites, recruitment agents and consultants acting on their behalf”, he added.

Qiu’s profile on LinkedIn, written in English, describes her as having been the chief executive of BR-YR Executive Search for more than six years and says she is based in Beijing. Her listed interests include the UK’s Department for Transport and the Tony Blair Institute.

Shen’s profile, also largely in English, describes her as the co-founder of InternshipUnion, based in Hangzhou, eastern China. She says it “has helped hundreds of students come to China do their internship” and she describes herself as “a positive Asia girl” who would “welcome friends all over world join us to get a magic Chinese experience”.

Qiu, Shen and the Chinese embassy in London have been approached for comment.

Security minister Dan Jarvisconfirmed that the alert had been sent out in a lunchtime Commons statement. “This activity involves a covert and calculated attempt by a foreign power to interfere with our sovereign affairs in favour of its own interests, and this government will not tolerate it,” he told MPs.

He said MI5 had warned the espionage campaign was “being carried out by a group of Chinese intelligence officers, often masked through the use of cover companies or external headhunters”.

MI5 has previously warned about Chinese spies seeking to obtain information by using LinkedIn to recruit Britons working in sensitive areas. Posing as recruitment consultants, the agents, normally women, have sought to lure at least 10,000 Britons with potential job offers.