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Dagbladet wrote on Tuesday that a Chinese company has listed information on more than 700 Norwegians. The list must be stored in a database at a Chinese company linked to the country’s security service.
The list includes several Norwegian politicians, recognized community leaders, and recognized convicts. Several Norwegian celebrities are also listed in the database.
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Among them is the son of Crown Princess Mette-Marit, Marius Borg Høiby. The listing includes a photo code showing the 23-year-old from a national party in 2015. The photo was taken by an NTB scanpix photographer.
Dagbladet has contacted the Palace’s communications manager, Guri Varpe, who claims to have no comment on the case. Borg Høiby himself has not responded to Dagbladet’s question.
– Surprised
Manager Gunnar Greve is also on the list. To Dagbladet, he tells that it is difficult to be wise about the origin and background of the list.
– Therefore, consequently, it is also difficult to think so much about it. But the fact that security companies and others in China, the United States and several other countries prepare such lists does not surprise anyone, he says in a comment, continuing:
– I’m more surprised to be on the list. From what I can see and understand, this is pretty basic information that has been collected and shared, so I’m not too concerned about it, Greve explains.
He bought a house for 22 million
The manager believes the list serves as a reminder that everyone leaves digital trails and that personal information can quickly end up in the hands it shouldn’t be. He assumes he’s on the list himself because he has run an extensive business in China for the past five years. They are.
He has worked with and for Alan Walker, among others.
“Also, I worked for a Shanghai / Hong Kong company that was partly owned by the Chinese Internet company Tencent until May of this year,” he says.
I got a new job
Included as “close connection”
The two celebrities are accompanied, among others, by Labor leader Jonas Gahr Støre, Minister Guri Melby and the head of the Police Security Service, Hans Sverre Sjøvold.
The list, which has been mentioned previously by international media such as The Washington Post and The Guardian, will contain information on a total of 2.4 million people around the world, of which more than 700 are Norwegian.
Apparently, the people on the list fall into three categories: politically exposed person, person of special interest, and family or close connection.
These are on the secret Chinese list
Both Borg Høiby and Gunnar Greve are in the latter category. The second category includes 29 people convicted of terrorism, corruption, fraud and drug-related crimes.
Dagbladet has obtained access to the list through the cybersecurity company Internet 2.0. The company’s David Robinson believes the list is an overview of personal information about influencers and their loved ones.
“It seems that it is a commercial operation to build a platform to sell information to the Chinese security service,” he told Dagbladet.
PST puts the list in potential context with its own national threat assessment earlier this year, that intelligence services in foreign states will conduct surveys, as well as collect contact information on employees of Norwegian companies.
– PST has previously said that China is one of several countries conducting intelligence activities against Norway. We are also aware that intelligence services in foreign states cooperate with commercial actors to obtain the information they need, Annett Aamodt, PST senior adviser, told Dagbladet.
Explain that contact information, such as phone numbers and email addresses, will serve as a starting point for a more specific technical gathering at a later date.
– Examples of technical acquisition can be infiltrations in the network or eavesdropping. This list may appear as such a type of survey.
