This is bothersome to me. That's just information that isn't very useful unless you want to cause mayhem. And, given the fact that he's Chinese makes it even more troubling. ___________________________NOAA employee charged with stealing U.S. dam information| Reuters (Reuters) - A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) employee in Ohio has been charged with stealing sensitive information from a federal database for the nation's dams and lying about the breach to federal agents, prosecutors said. Xiafen "Sherry" Chen, 59, was arrested on Monday at the NOAA office in Wilmington, Ohio, about 50 miles northeast of Cincinnati, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Ohio said in a statement on Monday. Chen was charged with theft, illegally accessing a federal database and two counts of making false statements to investigators. She could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison if convicted on the theft charge and five years each if convicted on the other charges, prosecutors said. Chen was accused of accessing restricted areas of the National Inventory of Dams on various days in May 2012 and downloading sensitive files and providing false information to investigators in June 2013, prosecutors said. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the National Dam Safety Review Board maintain the database, which consists of dams meeting certain hazard or height criteria.
And it took a year for the investigators to talk to her after the 2012 download activity? If that is the case, whatever she took, has been transferred into Chinese hands. Spying happens all the time.... for what end goal this information could be used... time will tell. Maybe trying to find soft targets for sabotage that already have maintenance issues or weakened construction..... that could be exploited.
My son had an interest in blowing up buildings for a living. (,I think he is past that stage now) but he learned that to blow them up you must understand what holds them up in the first place. Learn the weak spots, and where the stress loads are. If you fully understand the machine, it is much easier to destroy it.
Reminds me of the Movie "Force 10 from Navarone" "Oh, I can do a Good Job on a Dam. All you have to do is pull the Plug, and you have all your forces working for you."
Years ago a local bridge was "wired" with string and wooden blocks by a team from Ft. Bragg. They got "caught" and nearly arrested till the parts were discovered to be fake. Point is: they were hitting "choke points" in a big area to limit movement. Back to the thread. What better way to cripple "electronic America" than to remove it's electrical generating ability. Merely hitting the transformers across the nation would put a very long term kink in our way of life.
Most of the spying china has done historically has been by using chinese nationals living in foreign countries.
