Page:ISC-China.pdf/80

CHINA

GCHQ

186. GCHQ statistics show a similar picture:
     • Between 2000 and 2019, the number of GCHQ and National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) staff working on China increased from *** FTE to *** FTE.
     • In 2020, this increased to *** FTE.^[1]
     • The percentage of operational effort dedicated to China has increased from ***% in 2000 to ***% in 2019.^[2]
     • Operational effort on China rose to ***% in 2020.^[3]
     • ***.^[4]

 

MI5

187. MI5 statistics provide an overall picture of work on Hostile State Activity (HSA), of which China is only one strand:
     • For the financial year 2019/20, HSA^[5] was allocated a total spend of £*** (International Counter-Terrorism and Northern Ireland-related terrorism received £*** and £*** respectively).
     • Of that £***, work on China received £***.
     • This was an increase of £*** from the previous year (but it nevertheless only represents a return to the levels of ***).^[6]
     • The proportion of mission effort on China is around ***%. This roughly equates to *** people.^[7]

 

JIO

188. JIO similarly has found it difficult to disaggregate exactly:
     • In March 2021, the JIO China Team^[8] contained *** FTE staff with *** due to be advertised (an increase from *** FTE pre-2017 and *** FTE in early 2019). In addition, there *** dedicated to China open source work.^[9]

---

1. Oral evidence—GCHQ, *** October 2020.
2. ***
3. Oral evidence—GCHQ, *** October 2020.
4. Written evidence—GCHQ, 4 March 2020. On *** December 2020, NCSC further explained that as well as those engaged in threat-focused work (i.e. an analysis and investigative point of view ***), there were also people who supported that analytical effort, and those whose work is threat-agnostic *** (although this work is informed by knowledge of the threat posed by China—amongst others).
5. ***. These three operational themes are: International Counter-Terrorism (ICT), Northern Ireland-related terrorism (NIRT), and Hostile State Activity (HSA).
6. Written evidence—MI5, 9 October 2020. MI5 told us that its "operational model dynamically draws on a range of resources within MI5 and beyond" ***. (Written evidence—MI5, 12 June 2019.)
7. Director General MI5 explained: ***. (Oral evidence—MI5, *** October 2020.)
8. JIO has noted that China assessments are produced by several different teams ***.
9. However, the team also receives support from other teams working on HSA, economic assessments ***.

70