SINGAPORE/NEW DELHI, April 16 (The Straits Times/ANN): The offer seemed prestigious.
A “senior program manager” claiming to be from the National University of Singapore (NUS) approached senior Indian journalist Aditya Raj Kaul on professional networking site LinkedIn, inviting him to write for a weekly journal.
He would be paid “400 dollars” for each article on assigned topics – well above market rates in India. There would even be a bonus, should his work be “indeed excellent”.
But Mr Kaul, executive editor of national security and strategic affairs at TV9 Network, one of the country’s biggest television news entities, found no mention of the manager – a “Julia Chia” – on the NUS website or in a Google search.
“I realised there’s something fishy, something wrong,” Mr Kaul told The Sunday Times.
There were also other red flags. The journal “Policy Perception”, he was told, is only for “internal reference” and his articles would not be published or found publicly. He cut off contact with the person.
Mr Kaul, who was contacted in January, believes he was a target of a recent suspected influence operation in India, run largely on social media and personal messaging platforms by individuals claiming to represent Singapore-based institutions such as NUS, the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA) think-tank, and recruitment firm Kerry Consulting.
All three institutions say the individuals do not work for them and that they do not reach out to potential writers via such means.
Those targeted so far are experienced and well-connected journalists and researchers across India who specialise in defence and geopolitical issues.
The modus operandi involved multiple fake employees of Singapore institutions who operate across platforms such as LinkedIn and Twitter, as well as through personal WhatsApp messages and e-mail. It is not clear if they are coordinated.
ST spoke to four journalists who were approached between January and March.
One of them is Delhi-based newspaper Hindustan Times’ foreign editor Rezaul Hasan Laskar, who reported on the operation on March 29 with a colleague.
Unnamed Indian security officials told the paper that the modus operandi was similar to other operations conducted by China in countries such as Australia, Canada and the United States.
On March 10, Mr Laskar received a message from one “Jian Qiang Wong” on LinkedIn, who claimed to be a researcher at SIIA and wanted to “build a cooperation relation” with him.
He ignored it due to several red flags, including the dodgy grammar, but checked with others in media and policy circles to see if they too had received such messages. He found at least a dozen who had been approached by similar “Singapore-based” individuals.
“They were very specifically looking at people who would have access to sensitive information,” Mr Laskar told ST.
The list, he added, included those who work closely with the government, including several serving and retired army officials at a top think-tank.
None of them is known to have responded to these messages.
After the Hindustan Times report was published, some of the online profiles used to approach individuals were deleted.
Mr Neeraj Rajput, an independent journalist, was also contacted by “Julia Chia”, first on Twitter and then via a Gmail account in February.
He did not pursue the offer. His suspicions were raised when the e-mail did not come from an official NUS account, but from “juliachia.nus@gmail.com”.
Yet another alias used was a “Selina Yee”, who claimed to be from Kerry Consulting, according to screenshots seen by ST.
The e-mail used was “selinayee@kerryconsult.com”, which is similar to the genuine e-mail domain of Kerry Consulting – “@kerryconsulting.com”.
Both NUS and SIIA said the people who approached Indian journalists and researchers do not represent them.
An NUS spokesman said: “There is no such journal in NUS.”
SIIA put up a statement on its website on March 30, saying it does not convey official correspondence over social media platforms.
A Kerry Consulting spokesman said its staff will send e-mails from only the verified www.kerryconsulting.com domain.
“We take fraudulent communication extremely seriously and will be reporting this matter to the Singapore police for further investigation,” he added.
As to why Singapore-based institutions were used in the latest attempts, Mr Muhammad Faizal Abdul Rahman, a research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), said fake online identities need to appear legitimate and trustworthy.
They would impersonate experts and institutions with brands that inspire trust, confidence and competence. “This is something that experts and institutions in global cities, including Singapore, have,” he said.
Singapore, too, has previously been entangled in attempts by individuals at undue foreign influence.
Singaporean Dickson Yeo, a former PhD student at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, pleaded guilty to acting within the US as an illegal agent of Chinese intelligence in 2020.
He had posted a fake job listing on LinkedIn and attracted US military and government employees with security clearances to write reports for him.
Assistant Professor Dylan Loh from Nanyang Technological University’s Public Policy and Global Affairs programme said that countries of all stripes engage in some intelligence, information and influence operations, especially major powers with much larger interests.
While public diplomacy and cultural outreach are generally legitimate activities, they cross a line when they are done illegally, surreptitiously and under false pretences, as is the current case in India, he added.
“Once someone is enticed by the paid work, sunk costs and the commitment will make the target pliable for further cultivation and perhaps deeper, more nefarious kinds of activity,” said Prof Loh. - The Straits Times/ANN
