A defense minister has confirmed that the Ministry of Defence is currently investigating the potential threats associated with Chinese vehicles, while staff have been instructed to avoid discussing secret matters in any vehicles.
Security Guidance for MoD Personnel
In a recent appearance on LBC, Luke Pollard addressed claims that Ministry of Defence staff have been instructed not to discuss secret material while riding in China-made vehicles.
He explained that the ministry is “looking into” Chinese vehicles within its vehicle pools, however stressed that safety is a concern in every modern vehicles.
Our department has a collection of thousands of cars in the MoD and those vehicles represent a very small number.
However regardless of if you’re driving a Chinese car or a non-Chinese car, our instruction to our people is not to plug MoD technology into their car, to avoid having conversations at a classified level in any kind of car, due to the growing threats of surveillance that exist in every single automobile, to only have those secret conversations in protected areas. This is a wise and sensible thing for everyone concerned about security.
After it was put to him that it would be wise for the ministry to stop using all cars from China, Pollard responded: That is exactly what we’re investigating at the moment.”
Broader Security Background
This announcement follows reports from Norway and Denmark have alerted the UK to the presence of multi-purpose kill switches in Chinese-made electric buses, which could allow the Chinese government to disable public transport and cause chaos to public transit.
Furthermore, a Russia spy ship was reportedly shining lasers at RAF aircrew, labeled a “highly dangerous” act by defence officials.
The wider security situation highlights the importance of robust measures and caution in every areas of official activities, including transport usage to communication practices.
