China’s war against Chinese nationals and others who criticize the Chinese government but live outside of China is being waged with a relatively new weapon: impersonation.
Here’s what happens. Minions of the Chinese Communist Party set up email and other accounts in the name of the target, say, Smith, and then use the fake accounts of “Smith” to make violent threats against somebody or otherwise provoke the attention of local law enforcement. If the tactic works, Smith’s domicile is raided and Smith, if he survives the raid, is arrested and, possibly, jailed. Perhaps he is quickly exonerated. Even so, Smith has been harassed, he may be forever after remembered as that guy who got raided, says he’s innocent but who knows. And he must now worry about the possibility of further such assaults on his name and person.
This is the kind of thing that happened to Andrew Phalen. For New Lines Magazine, Jemimah Steinfeld reports (August 21, 2023):
Andrew Phelan was preparing his Melbourne home for the arrival of his elderly, unwell mother when the doorbell rang. Standing next to the man whom Phelan had booked to help assemble a bed were four police officers. They were carrying firearms. They barged into his house and told Phelan—a high-profile China watcher and commentator—that he was under arrest. A Chinese-Australian reporter had contacted the Victoria state police to say she’d received an email from him threatening to rape and kill her. Phelan knew he was innocent; the police, at that stage, did not. . . . So they raided his home and took his laptops, phone and an internal drive as evidence. . . .
It was only after the police had gone through his files and emails that they too realized he was innocent. He was released later that day, and his name cleared.
Or was it? . . .
“What if some people might say, ‘Did he actually send that email?’ ” he asked. . . .
Phelan is part of a new and growing club of people whose names and identities are being hijacked and used for nefarious purposes. It’s a disparate group stretching across the globe and contains activists, journalists, academics and lawyers. All are tied together by one common thread—they criticize China. . . .
Those targeted typically came from the Chinese diaspora, however, and it is only recently that people of other nationalities have found themselves affected. It’s also only recently that the use of fake identities has entered the playbook. And it’s only in the last few months, or even weeks, that it’s mushroomed to an alarming degree.
Steinfeld observes that although Chinese authorities have a long history of going after people who are beyond China’s borders, until recently such pursuit had to be very selective. Modern technology has changed the cost-benefit calculation. “Today, anyone who criticizes Beijing from anywhere in the world can find themselves a target of the Chinese Communist Party, and Xi does not take criticism lightly. Under the current president, control of dissent has ramped up to a level not seen since Mao.”
