A defense minister has confirmed that the Ministry of Defence is currently looking into the potential threats associated with Chinese-made vehicles, and personnel have been told to avoid talking about secret information in all cars.
Security Guidance for Defence Staff
During a recent interview on LBC, Luke Pollard addressed reports that Ministry of Defence staff have been instructed not to discuss secret material while travelling in Chinese cars.
The minister said that the MoD is “investigating” cars from China within its vehicle pools, but noted that security is a issue in every contemporary vehicles.
We have a collection of thousands of vehicles in the MoD and those vehicles account for a tiny fraction.
However whether you’re driving a vehicle from China or a non-Chinese car, our instruction to our staff is to avoid connecting MoD devices into their vehicle, to avoid having discussions at a classified level in any vehicle, due to the increasing threats of surveillance that exist in all vehicle, to only have those secret conversations in protected areas. This is a wise and reasonable thing for anyone worried about safety.
When it was suggested that it would be wise for the ministry to stop using all Chinese vehicles, the minister replied: ‘That’s precisely what we are looking into at the present time.”
Broader Defence Context
This announcement follows claims from Scandinavian countries have alerted the UK to the presence of dual-use kill switches in Chinese-made buses, which could allow China to disable buses and cause chaos to transport systems.
Additionally, a Russia spy ship was reportedly shining lasers at Royal Air Force pilots, described as a “highly dangerous” act by defence officials.
This wider security situation underscores the significance of robust protocols and vigilance in every aspects of government operations, including transport use to communication habits.
