Sleeper agent is sign of huge spy threat, says Australia
Australia’s national intelligence agency has broken up a large foreign spy ring but faces an unprecedented level of espionage directed from overseas, its director-general has revealed.
Mike Burgess, head of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), said it had stopped a “sleeper” agent running a spy ring that provided logistical and financial support for foreign agents engaged in intelligence-gathering and the harassment of dissidents.
“The level of threat we face from foreign espionage and interference activities is unprecedented,” Mr Burgess said. “It is higher now than it was at the height of the Cold War.”
Although he did not name the foreign power behind the sleeper agent and spy ring, his speech was widely interpreted as a warning to China
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/australia-breaks-up-large-foreign-spy-ring-b2q9hl8mv