China was behind cyber attacks on the UK election watchdog, MPs and peers, the deputy PM said today.
In a dramatic statement to the Commons, Oliver Dowden for the first time pointed the finger at Beijing over meddling in the political system.
He said state-linked groups had targeted the Electoral Commission’s records of 40million Brits, as well as the emails of prominent critics who had ‘called out’ activities.
‘Later today a number of our international partners including the US will be issuing similar statements in order to expose this activity,’ he said.
Mr Dowden said there was a ‘clear pattern of activity’ from China.
But he insisted that none of the hacking attempts had been successful. He said that while the compromise of electoral register details was ‘concerning’ it was unlikely to cause any harm.
Officials could be subject to sanctions, with the action likely to be coordinated with other Western countries.
Earlier, Rishi Sunak warned that Britain must ‘defend ourselves’ against the ‘increasingly assertive’ behaviour by the Asian power.
Downing Street added that the UK had its ‘eyes wide open when it comes to China’.
However, critics have accused the government of acting too slowly and raised concerns that the response will not go far enough. The Chinese state has previously been linked to meddling in the NHS.
Labour MPs swiped that the announcement is just ‘party management’ on an issue that raises passions among Tory MPs.
China’s foreign ministry responded this morning by insisting countries should not ‘spread disinformation’ by making accusations without a ‘factual basis’.
Ministers are poised to blame China for cyberattacks on the elections watchdog and MPs (pictured, a meeting of the National People’s Congress earlier this month)
Rishi Sunak (pictured visiting Barrow today) pointed to the ‘increasingly assertive’ behaviour by Beijing branding the Asian power the ‘greatest state-based threat to our economic security’
Deputy PM Oliver Dowden (pictured right with Lord Cameron) is expected to take the dramatic step of accusing Beijing of being behind a hack that accessed the personal details of 40million Brits.
Speaking at an engineering firm in Barrow, Mr Sunak said: ‘We’ve been very clear that the situation now is that China is behaving in an increasingly assertive way abroad, authoritarian at home and it represents an epoch-defining challenge, and also the greatest state-based threat to our economic security.
‘So, it’s right that we take measures to protect ourselves, which is what we are doing.’
He would not be drawn on the hacking announcement, saying: ‘When it comes to cyber, we have the National Cyber Security Centre, which is world leading.
‘Indeed, when I’m out and about across the world, other leaders want to learn and talk to us because they believe that our capabilities in this country are very strong.’
Mr Dowden is set to link China to the attack on the Electoral Commission, which admitted last August that ‘hostile actors’ had got into its systems as far back as 2021.
A small group of politicians who are hawkish on China are said to have been called to a briefing by Parliament’s director of security, Alison Giles, in relation to the activity.
They include former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, former minister Tim Loughton, crossbench peer Lord Alton and SNP MP Stewart McDonald.
The four are members of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) pressure group, which focuses on issues involving the increasingly assertive Asian power.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Westminster Hour last night, Mr Loughton said the challenge from China had not been taken ‘seriously’ up to now.
‘China is a strategic threat,’ he said. ‘I think it is the most dangerous nation on the planet across a whole range of issues, security but also climate change.
‘But the trouble with the Chinese Communist Party government is that you have to call them out, you have to stand up to them and there have to be consequences.
‘That is the only language that the Chinese government actually understand and if you just say all this is not very good could you do better please then they laugh in your face.’
Luke de Pulford, executive director of IPAC, told the BBC’s Today programme that the government had taken two years to ‘call out’ the behaviour of China.
He said it was ‘ludicrous’ there is still a debate on whether China should be treated as posing an ‘enhanced’ risk of meddling.
But China’s Foreign Ministry said Beijing is a ‘main target’ of hacking, suggesting that the UK needed to cooperate more.
According to a translation, spokesman Lin Jian said: ‘We combat all sorts of malicious actions online, and we advocate all countries to deal with this together through dialogues and cooperation.
‘Tracking of origins of cyber attacks is highly sensitive and complicated. It must be fully backed with objective evidence, and one should not pin the blame on certain countries without any factual basis.’
He added that countries needed to ‘stop spreading disinformation and take a responsible attitude’.
Tory MP Tim Loughton (pictured) said the challenge from China had not been taken ‘seriously’ up to now
Lord Cameron is set to address Tory MPs at a special meeting of the 1922 Committee this evening.
Nuclear minister Andrew Bowie said he could not comment on the speculation about China but told LBC radio this morning: ‘The fact is that this Government has invested a lot of time, money and effort in ensuring that our cybersecurity capabilities are at the place they need to be, we’ve increased the powers of our intelligence and security community to be able to deal with these threats.
‘And we will stop at nothing to ensure that the British people, our democracy, our freedom of speech and our way of life is defended.’
He insisted the Government took a pragmatic approach to dealing with Beijing, amid reports that China’s EVE Energy is set to invest in a battery plant in the West Midlands.
‘We have to have a grown-up, pragmatic relationship with China. And that means looking at each of these investments in the round, on a case-by-case basis, ensuring that our security and our individual liberties and freedoms are not undermined by any of the investments that are that are underway.’
Meanwhile, reforms of UK spying laws are continue to make their way through Parliament, with the Investigatory Powers (Amendment) Bill also in the Commons on Monday.
The legislation includes measures to make it easier for agencies to examine and retain bulk datasets, such as publicly available online telephone records.
