The FBI has labelled China “the most dominant threat” to US companies, saying it believed Beijing was the main culprit behind a 53 per cent jump in economic espionage cases its agents are investigating.
FBI officials warned on Thursday that hundreds of billions of dollars were now being lost every year from the theft of trade secrets, intellectual property, sales and pricing information and other company data, posing a national security threat to the US.
“China is the most dominant threat we face from economic espionage,” said Randall Coleman, assistant director of the agency’s counterintelligence unit. “The Chinese government plays a significant role. The playing field is not level.”