Ex-US soldier Joseph Daniel Schmidt arrested for trying to provide defence info to China
- The former army sergeant, who served in an intelligence unit, allegedly offered Chinese authorities a device that allowed access to secure military networks
- Schmidt had been in China, primarily in Hong Kong, since March 2020, and was arrested in San Francisco when he returned to the US
A former US Army sergeant was arrested on Friday for seeking to provide classified information to China, the Justice Department said.
Joseph Daniel Schmidt, 29, who served in an army intelligence unit from 2015 until 2020, is charged with retaining national defence information and attempting to deliver it to China.
The Justice Department said Schmidt, after leaving the military, offered national defence information to the Chinese consulate in Turkey and the Chinese security services.
In March 2020, Schmidt, who had access to secret and top secret information while serving in the 109th Military Intelligence Battalion at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state, went to Hong Kong, where he “continued his efforts to provide Chinese intelligence with classified information”.
“He allegedly retained a device that allows for access to secure military computer networks and offered the device to Chinese authorities to assist them in efforts to gain access to such networks,” the department said.