Crossing the River of Secrecy China's Cyber Strategy 2000s-2010s

Crossing the River of Secrecy China's Cyber Strategy 2000s-2010s

Since the 2000s, cyber units of the People's Liberation Army and groups affiliated with the Ministry of State Security have targeted aerospace, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, and advanced materials, acquiring intellectual property through long-term hiding and quiet extraction. In 2013, the APT1 report identified a unit in Shanghai, making state involvement visible; in 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted government personnel for the first time; in 2003, the U.S.-China agreement was limited in its deterrence; in 2006, APT10 used MSPs and cloud computing as a springboard for lateral expansion across the supply chain, exposing the limits of perimeter defense. In the background, China Manufacturing 2025 and military-civilian fusion, and the idea of buying time for R&D, have driven the operation. Countries countered with zero-trust, enhanced auditing, judicial measures, sanctions, and shared attribution through alliance coordination, but the offensive became an endu
rance war. 2010s Chinese cyber strategy is a long-term design that combines industrial policy, information operations, and supply networks, and the threat continues into the 2020s and beyond. Cyber aggression as a low-cost, asymmetric tool ran parallel to investment and talent acquisition, blurring borders and public-private boundaries.