A 51-year-old Chinese man has been sentenced to four years in jail for stealing information on "cutting-edge" US military aircraft.
Su Bin, a businessman working in aviation and aerospace, was handed the jail term by a Los Angeles court who also ordered him to pay a $10,000 (£7,600) fine for his part in accessing the compromised information.
He pleaded guilty to the charges – conspiring to gain unauthorised access to a protected computer and violating the Arms Export Control Act – after being arrested in Canada in 2014 and extradited to the US.
Working with military officers in China, Su highlighted what files to steal, and why the information was important, as he and others "stole sensitive military and export-controlled data and sent the stolen information to China".
He was emailed a directory list of files by someone who had accessed the data, then highlighted parts that could have the highest value if sold on. Su also translated documents from English to Chinese. China's Second Department, General Staff Headquarters, and Chinese People’s Liberation Army were given details of the stolen information.
"Su assisted the Chinese military hackers in their efforts to illegally access and steal designs for cutting-edge military aircraft that are indispensable to our national defence," assistant attorney General Carlin said in a statement.
When Su pleaded guilty, on March 23, US prosecutors said the data taken included information relating to the "C-17 strategic transport aircraft and certain fighter jets produced for the US military".
Some of the information was taken from Boeing's computers in Orange County, California. The entire operation took place from October 2008 to March 2014. Data listed on the US munitions listed, which is contained in the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, US prosecutors said.
The maximum sentence Su could have received was a $225,000 (£170,00) fine and five years in jail.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
