FBI Director Wray Tells Congress China 'Greatest Counterintelligence Threat' Facing US

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 25th September, 2020) China is the greatest counterintelligence threat the United States faces, FBI Director Christopher Wray told a hearing of the US Senate Committee on Homeland Security on Thursday.

"China is the greatest counterintelligence threat to this country," Wray said. "[They are] much broader and wider in terms of their reach, they use economic levers very heavily."

The FBI currently listed more than 2,000 open espionage investigations with China, Wray told the Homeland Security Committee.

The FBI Director said there had been a 1,300 percent increase in espionage investigations involving China over the past decade and it now comprised by far the biggest part of the Bureau's counterintelligence portfolio.

The FBI has also been seeing aggressive activity by the Chinese to target US vaccine research, Wray added.

Acting Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli said earlier that China has many more levers, which Iran and Russia do not have, as well as relations at every level of government and connections to the US economy.