US not convinced China can collect real-time data from spy balloons

Posted On: April 4, 2023

Tuesday, April 4, 2023 | 09:05 WIB

Surya Lesmana / LES

The US Navy recovers a spy balloon off Myrtle Beach, South Carolina in the Atlantic Ocean on February 5, 2023.

Washington, Beritasatu.com– The US government until Monday (03/04/2023) local time still could not confirm reports that China may be collecting direct data (real time) from a spy balloon while flying over a military site. Currently, the analysis is still ongoing.

NBC News reported on Monday that Chinese spy balloons could transmit data to Beijing online real time despite the efforts of the US government to prevent it. This report could heat up the political situation in the United States, given that Republicans have criticized President Joe Biden for his slowness in bringing down the spy balloon.

NBC cited two current senior officials and one former senior official.

The White House and the Pentagon told reporters they could not confirm the report. The Pentagon said experts were still analyzing debris collected from the balloon after it was shot down on February 4.

“I can’t confirm that there was real-time transmission of the ball to China at that time,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said, adding that “it’s something we let’s analyze right now”.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing and the Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.

The balloon, which Beijing denies being a government spy boat, flew over the United States and Canada for a week before the US military shot it down off the Atlantic coast on Biden’s orders.

Reuters reported that US officials believe the spy balloon is controlled by Beijing and capable of maneuvering as it flies over the United States, sometimes aiming left or right.

At the time, however, US officials played down the balloon’s impact on national security, saying it was taking steps to limit its ability to collect information from sensitive US sites.

This belief also undermines the idea that the balloon is much more capable of gathering information than Chinese spy satellites, while acknowledging the balloon’s ability to hang around US locations longer than the satellite.

The Chinese spy balloon incident prompted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a planned visit to Beijing and further strained relations between Washington and Beijing.

The episode caused an uproar in Washington and led the US military to search for other objects in the sky that were not picked up by radar.

The FBI has led the way in the analysis since the United States said on February 17 that it had carried out a successful recovery effort from South Carolina to collect sensors and other debris from a balloon. Chinese spy.

# Spy balloon# Chinese spy balloon# Real-time data