‘Chinese spy balloon gathered information from US military sites’

Image used for representational purpose. Pic/iStock

A Chinese spy balloon that flew across the US was able to gather intelligence from several sensitive American military sites and transmit it back to Beijing in real-time, despite the Biden administration's efforts to block it, a media report said on Monday. A suspected Chinese spy balloon said to be the size of three buses, was spotted over the airspace of the United States in late January.

China was able to control the balloon so it could make multiple passes over some of the sites (at times flying figure-eight formations) and transmit the information it collected back to Beijing in real time, NBC News reported, quoting three unnamed officials. The intelligence China collected was mostly from electronic signals, which can be picked up from weapons systems or include communications from base personnel, rather than images, the officials were quoted as saying in the report.

Also read: China calls on SCO countries to crackdown on separatism, terrorism

The balloon first entered US airspace from Alaska on January 28, according to the Biden administration. Over the next four days, it was flying over the Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana, where the US has some of its nuclear assets. The US National Security Council has referred NBC News to the Defence Department for comment.

This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever