A former US Army intelligence officer, Joseph Daniel Schmidt, faces charges of attempting to furnish classified defense information to Chinese security services during the Covid-19 pandemic. The information allegedly included details contained within a Microsoft Word document titled “Important Information to Share with Chinese Government.”
Schmidt, aged 29, was apprehended at San Francisco International Airport upon his arrival from Hong Kong, where he had resided since March 2020. The Justice Department confirmed the arrest following an indictment by a federal grand jury in Seattle, charging him with the retention and attempted delivery of national defense information.
A public defender, appointed to represent Schmidt during his brief appearance at the US District Court in San Francisco, did not provide immediate comment. Records from the US District Court in Seattle did not list an attorney representing Schmidt on the charges. Both the US attorney’s office and the federal public defender’s office had no information regarding his legal representation.
An FBI declaration in the case quoted Schmidt as expressing his disagreement with unspecified aspects of American policy and his growing discomfort with the American government. In an email to his sister, he stated, “I don’t talk about it often, but I learned some really terrible things about the American government while I was working in the army, and I no longer feel safe living in America or like I want to support the American government.”
Schmidt served for five years in active duty within the army, mainly assigned to the 109th Military Intelligence Battalion at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state. He eventually assumed the role of a team leader on a human intelligence squad, affording him access to secret and top-secret defense information.
In January 2020, Schmidt left active duty and traveled to Istanbul, where he initiated contact with the Chinese consulate by email, expressing his intention to move to China and share information obtained during his career as an interrogator. He indicated his possession of a current top-secret clearance and requested an in-person meeting to discuss these matters due to concerns about discussing them via email.
This marked the initial step in several attempts to convey information to the People’s Republic of China. Two days later, Schmidt drafted a Word document titled “Important Information to Share with Chinese Government,” containing classified data related to national defense. This document was retrieved from his Apple iCloud account.
Upon returning to the United States from Turkey in March 2020, Schmidt departed for Hong Kong, where he had resided since. Over the following months, he reached out to two state-owned enterprises in China, including a subsidiary of the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation Limited that specializes in intelligence-gathering software tools.
Schmidt offered to provide an encryption key he had retained for accessing the army’s classified information network, known as the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPR). He suggested that this key could be reverse-engineered to facilitate China’s access to SIPR, noting its rarity outside of the intelligence community and its potential to enhance China’s capabilities.
The declaration did not elaborate on any response from the state-owned enterprises or China’s security services.
The charges against Schmidt carry a maximum penalty of ten years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
By Ap
