Warning to China over cyber activity

Diplomatic reaction possible, professor says

A DIPLOMATIC ‘‘adjustment’’ in the relationship between New Zealand and China could occur after Chinese hackers targeted intellectual property and commercial data, a University of Otago political specialist says.

New Zealand’s Government Communications Security Bureau has said it has established links between the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) and cybertheft from service providers, some of whom operated from New Zealand.

Prof Robert Patman, of the Department of Politics, said the announcement by the GCSB on China’s activities could be seen as a warning to the leadership in Beijing.

It could be perceived as a signal China could not expect to dictate terms of its relations with New Zealand.

‘‘China would be well advised that it better live up to [its] own claims that states with different political systems can trade on mutual advantageous terms,’’ Prof Patman said.

China valued friendly ties between the two countries, and recognised New Zealand was an independent Westernoriented policy player, compared with countries such as Australia, which were more closely aligned to the United States.

‘‘The risk for China is that if it remains indifferent to Wellington’s concerns about China’s influence operations, including commercial spying, New Zealand will intensify efforts to diversify its diplomatic and economic network and downgrade the China connection in the process,’’ Prof Patman said.

On Friday morning, the US justice department announced criminal charges against two computer hackers said to be connected to the MSS.

The possibility of New Zealand as well as America bringing charges could not be ruled out in the future, depending on the scale and range of commercial espionage, Prof Patman

❛ China would be well advised that it better live up to [its] own claims that states with different political systems can trade on mutual advantageous terms

Prof Robert Patman

said.

‘‘ But the GCSB made it clear it is not just concerned about China. The cyber activities of other authoritarian states like Russia and North Korea have been singled out by the GCSB director as concerning.’’