Six Chinese nationals charged with economic espionage in US

Six Chinese nationals have been charged with economic espionage and theft of trade secrets from two companies that develop technology often used in military technologies by the US government, the Department of Justice said on Tuesday.

Those charged include three professors affiliated with state-run Tianjin University in northern China.

U.S. Assistant Attorney General John Carlin said economic espionage poses a significant threat to American businesses and their interests worldwide.

"According to the charges in the indictment, the defendants leveraged their access to and knowledge of sensitive U.S. technologies to illegally obtain and share U.S. trade secrets with the PRC for economic advantage", he said, referring to the abbreviated name of the communist state.

Professors Hao Zhang, 36, and Wei Pang, 35, who worked at tech companies Skyworks and Avago respectively, stole source codes, design layouts and other confidential documents from their companies and shared the information with individuals linked to the university, according to the indictment.

The stolen trade secrets allegedly enabled the school to construct and equip state-of-the-art technology facilities at China's state-sponsored market zone in the Tianjin Economic Development Area, it said.

Zhang was arrested Saturday at Los Angeles International Airport as he returned from China where he spoke at a conference.

The other professor was identified as 41-year-old Jinping Chen. Three others named in the indictment were identified as Huisui Zhang, 34, Chong Zhou, 26, and Zhao Gang, 39.

"As today's case demonstrates, sensitive technology developed by U.S. companies in Silicon Valley and throughout California continues to be vulnerable to coordinated and complex efforts sponsored by foreign governments to steal that technology", said U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag.