According to new allegations from the US Department of Justice (DoJ), two Chinese intelligence officers offered bribes – including Bitcoin and $600 in jewelry – for documents related to a US case against Chinese vendor Huawei.

The DoJ's indictment doesn't name Huawei, but according to multiple reports from the likes of CNN and the Wall Street Journal, the company is Huawei.

Figure 1: (Source: Karlis Dambrans on Flickr, CC 2.0)

According to a DoJ press release on the new allegations, the situation relates to "malign influence schemes and alleged criminal activity by a nation-state actor in the United States."

The two Chinese intelligence officers named in the indictment live in China and are unlikely to face charges.

According to CNN, the two Chinese spies – Gouchun He and Zheng Wang – developed a relationship starting in 2017 with an unnamed US law enforcement official. That official was involved in an ongoing Justice Department case announced in February 2020 that accuses Huawei of engaging in a racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to steal trade secrets. The case is part of a wider effort by the US against China generally and Huawei specifically. Huawei's equipment, according to US officials, can be used for Chinese espionage, a claim the company rejects.

According to the new DoJ indictment, the two Chinese spies sought to bribe a US law enforcement official for documents related to the US case against Huawei. For example, they asked the officials to tape prosecutors during trial strategy meetings so that they could share that information with Huawei.

According to CNN, they also paid $41,000 for a document marked "classified" related to the case. The document was fake and the law enforcement official was in fact a "double agent" under FBI supervision.

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— Mike Dano, Editorial Director, 5G & Mobile Strategies, Light Reading | @mikeddano