The Chinese warned dating spies is a risk women take with handsome foreign men. A new “dangerous love” poster was shared across government bulletin boards last Friday in honor of China’s National Security Education Day. Targeting mainly women government workers, the poster warned dating spies could be a real possibility through storytelling in a comic book-style format, according to ABC News on Tuesday.
Making its way around the internet, the “dangerous love” poster is being called an odd way for the Chinese government to warn women of possible espionage practices by foreign men. Readers are told about a handsome foreign man with red hair named David who starts dating a young, attractive woman known as Little Li who just so happens to be a member of the Chinese civil service.
The two fictitiously meet at a dinner party and start dating. David gains the love of Little Li through flowers and romantic dinners and lies about his true identity, saying he’s a scholar visiting China when he’s really a foreign spy. Little Li and David are both ultimately arrested after Little Li gives David secret government files from her job as a propaganda officer.
Chinese warned that dating spies pose a risk to government secrecy. Aiding a foreign spy in China is a crime that could be punishable by death. The New York Times reported on Tuesday that China recently sentenced a former computer technician to death for selling thousands of classified government documents to several foreign spies.
“The man, Huang Yu, 41, worked for a research institute specializing in cryptography in Chengdu, a city in southwestern China. He sold the materials, which included military codes, from 2002 to 2011, making about $700,000.”
The current president of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping, has been trying for the last three years to aggressively combat espionage and used China’s first National Security Education Day last Friday to increase his efforts. Hoping to rally support by the public to help catch foreign and domestic spies, the Chinese government gave speeches and distributed the “dangerous love” poster across several public bulletin boards on Friday.
DTN Dubai: China: Handsome foreign men could be spies: ‘Dangerous Love’ comic-style poster warns young female … https://t.co/tLON5NwTHA
— DTN Dubai (@DTNDubai) April 21, 2016
Last November, China also debuted its new anti-spy hotline, one year after introducing a new security law aimed at countering espionage by targeting foreign spies and Chinese citizens who help them. According to analysts, the China Communist Party continues to face increased political threats from overseas and is looking for new ways to heighten national security.
China’s analyst with Amnesty International, William Nee, says that the Chinese government’s concern for national security shouldn’t be taken lightly.
“The government hopes to send out a signal of deterrence to warn anybody who may be in a similar position of disclosing state secrets to foreign organization, while at the same time, giving the general public the perception that spies and potential spies may be in their midst, right at their side.”
CNN reports that not many people walking the streets of China are taking the comic poster too seriously. One female student in Beijing said that a lot of her friends have foreign boyfriends, and she would never believe they are spies. Another woman wondered if the poster was a joke, saying “this kind of stuff can happen anywhere.”
Some critics are calling the “dangerous love” poster China’s newest propaganda technique, saying the recent way the Chinese warned dating spies is a real concern for female government workers is “biased” and “misleading.” But China says it’s only trying to educate government employees about keeping classified documents classified, a message that some say should be kept within rank-and-file state employees and not plastered across government bulletin boards viewed by the public.
[Image by Double Chen News/YouTube]
