On Thursday, January 1st, Taiwan’s deputy director of the Investigation Bureau of the Ministry of Justice, David Hsu, revealed in detail to foreign media how the Chinese Communist Party recruits spies in Taiwan and the types of information they seek.
So far, Taiwan has uncovered hundreds of cases of Communist Party espionage through investigations, with some cases indicating that Beijing has made contact with senior officials in the Taiwanese government and military.
Hsu, in an interview with The Telegraph, stated, “These espionage activities may leak sensitive confidential information to mainland China, but relevant departments are working hard to prevent this.”
“We believe the situation is quite serious because they (referring to the CCP) are attempting to infiltrate Taiwan, whether through the military, administrative system, legislative bodies, public sectors, or private sectors,” he added.
According to the Investigation Bureau of the Ministry of Justice (MJIB) in Taiwan, around 80% of espionage cases are related to the Taiwanese Department of Defense, including active-duty military personnel, while the remaining 20% are connected to government officials. The MJIB is one of the nine agencies tasked with countering the threat of Communist espionage.
Hsu pointed out that, “If they (referring to the CCP) discover that these retired officers have connections to Taiwanese politicians, military, or diplomatic circles, they will try to approach and recruit them.”
He explained that the initial stages of this process usually involve “friending,” where individuals are treated to face-to-face encounters before taking the desired actions.
According to the MJIB, the Chinese Communist Party has three major espionage recruitment systems: party, government (including intelligence agencies and the state security department), and the military.
Another common strategy is to contact potential targets through online banking or “underground loans” channels. An example from 2022 involved a Taiwanese marine sergeant who, due to financial troubles from online gaming debts, stumbled upon a Chinese intelligence officer’s online loan advertisement. Upon learning of the sergeant’s military status, the officer offered cash rewards for providing classified military information.
Over the next year, the sergeant downloaded and printed top-secret documents from databases at two Taiwanese military bases, sending photos of the information to the officer online in exchange for monetary rewards totaling 170,000 New Taiwan Dollars. In 2025, the sergeant was sentenced to two years and two months in prison for violating Taiwan’s National Security Law.
Hsu summarized the common practices of the CCP in bribing soldiers to engage in espionage, stating that they target financially struggling soldiers, offering loans with the condition that they work for the CCP. Moreover, for exceptionally sensitive Taiwanese intelligence, the CCP provides additional incentives.
MJIB reported that some active and former military officers have been recruited by the CCP through dating apps as well as social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn, although such cases are relatively rare.
The methods employed by mainland China to recruit spies within Taiwan vary, with the most common practice involving face-to-face contact to build trust. Given the strict restrictions on Chinese citizens traveling to Taiwan and vice versa, CCP agents often wait for Taiwanese individuals to visit mainland China, whether for business or personal reasons, unwittingly becoming targets.
Hsu pointed out that when Beijing seeks to recruit certain Taiwanese government officials and their staff, they typically employ a unique strategy.
CCP spies seek out Taiwanese individuals who have studied in China and establish connections through their university networks. In China, most university committees have party branches whose members are responsible for recruiting targets, who subsequently become liaisons with other Taiwanese government departments.
“These individuals, upon completing their studies in China and returning to work for the Taiwanese government, become legislators, or hold public positions, receive directives from the mainland Chinese on collecting information regarding policies, budgets, or any other topics they wish to understand,” Hsu said.
In addition to stealing confidential information, targeted individuals are often directed by the CCP to recruit their colleagues to establish a larger network.
J. Michael Cole, a senior researcher at the Global Taiwan Institute and former Canadian intelligence officer, told The Telegraph that recruiters in such cases “often come from the same circle as the targeted individuals,” including the same political party, business, military branch, or even the same family.
A typical case in 2023 involved a Taiwanese ex-serviceman first recruited by a CCP intelligence officer, who then recruited nine active and retired military personnel to provide intelligence on key military bases and training modules.
While the majority of CCP targets are related to the Taiwanese military, Beijing also seeks government officials and political figures. In a high-profile case in September 2025, four individuals with close ties to the Taiwanese President and former Foreign Minister were sentenced to prison for engaging in espionage activities for Beijing.
Among them, Wu Shang-yu, a former adviser hired by the president’s office, received a four-year prison term for leaking President Lai Ching-te’s travel itinerary to Beijing.
He Ren-jie was sentenced to eight years and two months in prison; he had served as an assistant to Wu Zhao-xie when he was Secretary-General of the National Security Council before becoming the Foreign Minister.
“These are all government department members who participate in formulating rules and political policies, as well as reviewing or auditing budgets, so they are involved in many government affairs,” Hsu told The Telegraph.
Sometimes, Beijing also targets Taiwan’s elected officials or individuals running for public office, providing financial support for their campaigns to increase their chances of winning. Subsequently, Beijing can use these individuals to influence policy decisions.
These individuals often align with Beijing’s Taiwan policy and hold similar views on the so-called “unification” issue.
There have also been cases of arrests related to espionage activities involving members of Taiwan’s opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), including in early 2025 when a former aide to a KMT legislator and an aide to a KMT district assistant were arrested for allegedly engaging in espionage activities for mainland China.
As of September, Taiwan had brought espionage charges against 15 individuals in 2025, with the number expected to rise to 20 by the end of the year, yet significantly lower than the previous year’s report.
Regarding Taiwan’s response to the increasingly rampant CCP espionage activities, Hsu stated, “We believe we can effectively counter it because we have strong interdepartmental cooperation and capabilities.”
Despite such optimism, experts remain cautiously optimistic, cautioning that Beijing’s eyes are fixed on Taiwan and that they have invested considerable resources into espionage activities.