MPs targeted by China call on the UK government to strengthen response

MPs who have been targeted by China indicated today that they do not think the UK is doing enough to tackle the threat the Asian superpower poses.

In a statement to the House of Commons this afternoon, deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden described a “cyber threat posed by China-affiliated actors”.

Conservative MPs Sir Iain Duncan Smith and Tim Loughton as well as the SNP’s Stewart McDonald have all been targeted by China. The three are IPAC (Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China) members and are among the most “hawkish” parliamentarians.

Responding to Dowden’s statement this afternoon, Duncan Smith said: “[China is] not an ‘epoch-defining challenge’, strange as that may be, but they are surely a threat. And can [the government] now correct that so that we all know where we are?”.