CIA expands online recruitment of informants to China, Iran, North Korea

By Jonathan Landay

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. CIA on Wednesday launched a new drive to recruit informants in China, Iran and North Korea, adding to what it says has been a successful effort to enlist Russians.

The premier U.S. spy agency posted instructions in Mandarin, Farsi and Korean on its accounts on X, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, LinkedIn and the Dark Web on how to contact it securely, a CIA spokesperson said in a statement.

"Our efforts on this front have been successful in Russia, and we want to make sure individuals in other authoritarian regimes know that we're open for business," the spokesperson said, adding that the CIA was adapting to increased state repression and global surveillance.

A Mandarin-language video posted to YouTube featuring only written instructions advised individuals to contact the CIA via its official website using trusted encrypted Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) or the TOR network.

"Your safety and wellbeing is our foremost consideration," it said.

It asked for individuals' names, locations, and contact details not associated with their real identities, along with information that could be of interest to the CIA, cautioning that responses were not guaranteed and could take time.

Liu Pengyu, a Chinese embassy spokesman, accused the U.S. of waging "an organized and systematic" disinformation campaign against China and said that "any attempts to drive a wedge between the Chinese people and the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) or to weaken their close bond will inevitably fail."

The Russian embassy and Iran's U.N. mission did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The CIA's thirst for intelligence has grown as China expands cooperation with Russia and Iran and flexes its regional military muscle.

Russia, China, Iran and North Korea are known within the U.S. intelligence community as "hard targets" - countries whose governments are difficult to penetrate.

The U.S. also is grappling with Iran's conflict with Israel, its nuclear program, its growing links with Russia and its support for militant proxies.

North Korea's nuclear weapons program is another U.S. intelligence target, along with what U.S. officials say are Pyongyang's arms supplies to Moscow for the war against Ukraine, an allegation that Moscow and Pyongyang deny.

The CIA began recruiting Russians in 2022 by posting Russian language texts on its social media accounts on how to contact the agency securely, followed by videos in 2023.

(Additional reporting by Michael Martina; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Andrea Ricci)