Chinese Spies Stole Australia's New F-35 Lightning-II fighter Jet Design, Snowden Reveals
Jan 19, 2015
The latest document release by Edward Snowden revealed the industrial-scale cyber-espionage operation of China to learn the secrets of Australia's next front-line fighter aircraft – the US-built F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) . Chinese spies stole " many terabytes of data " about the design of Australia's Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II JSF, according to top secret documents disclosed by former US National Security Agency intelligence contractor Edward Snowden to German magazine Der Spiegel . Chinese spies allegedly stole as much as 50 terabytes of data, including the details of the fighter's radar systems, engine schematics, "aft deck heating contour maps," designs to cool exhaust gases and the method the jet uses to track targets. So far, the F-35 Lightning II JSF is the most expensive defence project in the US history. The fighter aircraft, manufactured by US-based Lockheed Martin, was developed at a cost of around $400 billion (£230 billion). Beijin...
