American colleges are on the front line in the battle against intellectual property theft by China. AP has obtained emails that show the U.S. government sees universities as vulnerable targets for theft of technology and trade secrets.
This Oct. 4, 2019 photo shows a copy of an FBI pamphlet and related emails. The FBI’s outreach to American colleges and universities about the threat of economic espionage includes this pamphlet that warns specifically about efforts by China to steal academic research.
The FBI has been reaching out to colleges and universities across the country as it tries to stem what American authorities portray as the wholesale theft of technology and trade secrets by researchers tapped by China. The breadth and intensity of the campaign emerges in emails The Associated Press obtained through records requests to public universities in 50 states. The emails underscore the extent of U.S.
“When we go to the universities, what we’re trying to do is highlight the risk to them without discouraging them from welcoming the researchers and students from a country like China,” John Demers, the Justice Department’s top national security official, said in an interview. The most consequential case this year centered not on a university but on Huawei, charged in January with stealing corporate trade secrets and evading sanctions. The company denies wrongdoing. Several universities including the University of Illinois, which received the FBI email last February, have since begun severing ties with Huawei.
Richard Wood, the then-interim provost at the University of New Mexico, conveyed ambivalence in an email to colleagues last year. He wrote that he took seriously the national security concerns the FBI identified in briefings, but also remained “deeply committed to traditional academic norms regarding the free exchange of scientific knowledge wherever appropriate — a tradition that has been the basis of international scientific progress for several centuries.
Kevin Gamache, chief research security officer for the Texas A&M University system, told AP he values his FBI interactions and that the communication goes both ways. The FBI shares threat information and administrators educate law enforcement about the realities of university research.The University of Nevada, Las Vegas vice president for research and economic development welcomed the assistance in a city she called the “birthplace of atomic testing.
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