Ministry says animals fitted with sensors by foreign agencies collect sensitive sea data, in ‘invisible secret war’

China’s ministry of state security has claimed that foreign espionage and intelligence agencies are using innovative new methods to monitor the country’s waters, including deploying “spy” animals fitted with sensors.

In a post on the Chinese platform WeChat on Friday, the ministry warned that an “invisible secret war” was quietly playing out in the seas around China as foreign agencies were collecting sensitive data “through a variety of new spying devices” to produce underwater maps that pose a “serious threat to our national security”.

Tech company says it ‘caught and disrupted’ NSO Group’s attempts to access accounts in Jordan and Lebanon

A spyware firm has been targeting WhatsApp users with malicious links in contravention of a US court order forbidding it from doing so, Meta has said.

In a post, Meta said WhatsApp had “caught and disrupted spear phishing attempts” by NSO Group, which a spokesperson said targeted a handful of users in Jordan and Lebanon. It had also caught the group creating “test accounts and groups” on WhatsApp.

David Rush, who was arrested in May, stole millions from US government through ‘special access program’, officials say

A former executive intelligence agent who is accused of stealing more than $40m in gold bars from the CIA reportedly created a fake spy program to siphon money, the latest on his fraudulent activity, the Washington Post first reported.

David Rush, who was a senior-level employee of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for 17 years, was arrested in May after FBI agents discovered Rush had taken 303 bullion bars, each about 2.2lbs, dozens of luxury watches, and more than $2m in foreign currency from his government office.