Page:ISC-China.pdf/98

CHINA

The UK Intelligence Community told the Committee in 2019 that the UK is leading internationally on countering the cyber threat from China. (Given that there has been a lot of public reporting regarding the UK's limited focus on China by comparison with its Five Eyes partners, it is interesting that the UK Intelligence Community consider that they are leading internationally on responding to the Chinese cyber threat.)

Operation WINDERMERE is a cross-UK Intelligence Community strategy to address Chinese cyber activity, led by GCHQ ***. It aims to "reduce the impact of the Chinese State's cyber programme on UK ***."

The strategy focuses on taking intelligence *** and using it for defence means (in order to make UK cyber space a hard operating environment) ***. The approach combines a mixture of diplomacy, law enforcement action and PROTECT work. ***.

The UK Intelligence Community say that they are working to identify and build knowledge of the Chinese cyber actors assessed to pose the highest threat to UK national security ***.


 * As such, encouraging other countries to demonstrate unity on the attribution of such behaviour (***) is key.

The 2019 ICE Plan, by comparison ***. These included:

Against the 'Trading Safely' pillar ***. ***.

***. ***.

Against the 'Countering Security Threats' pillar ***. *** ***.

In late 2020, GCHQ told us that: