"General Electric Insider Handed Two Years for IP Theft"

A New York man was recently sentenced to 24 months behind bars for his part in a conspiracy to steal aviation trade secrets and send them to China.  According to the Department of Justice (DoJ), Xiaoqing Zheng, 59, of Niskayuna, New York, was convicted of conspiracy to commit economic espionage after a four-week jury trial that ended in March last year.  DoJ noted that Zheng worked at GE Power’s Schenectady plant from 2008 to 2018, where he specialized in engineering turbine sealing technology.  His participation in the conspiracy saw top secret IP sent to Chinese companies and universities researching, developing, and manufacturing parts for turbines.  According to the FBI, Zheng is believed to be part of a sophisticated multi-year cyber-espionage campaign designed to help China gain parity with western aerospace firms and help it build the C919 commercial airliner.  According to the FBI Counterintelligence Division, Zheng was a member of the controversial Thousand Talents Program, a Communist Party initiative designed to recruit science and technology experts living abroad to make the country a world leader in the field by 2050.  According to a US Senate report, this and hundreds of other such programs lured as many as 60,000 experts between 2008 and 2016, many of whom had Chinese heritage.  That same report declared the scheme a threat to American interests, given its focus on IP theft.  Alongside his jail sentence, Zheng will be required to pay a $7500 fine and serve one year of supervised release post-imprisonment.

Infosecurity reports: "General Electric Insider Handed Two Years for IP Theft"