FBI Director likens China to 'the surveillance nightmare of East Germany combined with the tech of Silicon Valley'

FBI Director Christopher Wray discussed China during an address on Monday, including the threat posed to the U.S. by the Chinese government's massive theft of information.

"The Chinese government steals staggering volumes of information and causes deep, job destroying damage" that spans "a wide-range of industries. So much so, that ... we're constantly opening new cases to counter their intelligence operations, about every 12 hours or so," Wray noted.

"Just using cyber means, Chinese government hackers have stolen more of our personal and corporate data than every other nation combined," he said.

Onstage at the Reagan Library with Director of the FBI Christopher Wraywww.youtube.com

"The Chinese government is increasingly targeting people inside the U.S. for personal and political retribution," Wray said. He said that the types of people the CCP targets "are not those that a responsible government would make their enemies: Refugees, dissidents, and Uyghurs," individuals who have their own views and "speak or worship as their conscience dictates."

The FBI Director said that "China may be the first government to combine authoritarian ambitions with cutting edge technical capability. It's like the surveillance nightmare of East Germany combined with the tech of Silicon Valley."

Wray's speech comes just ahead of the Beijing Winter Olympics slated to begin in February.

The U.S. previously announced a diplomatic boycott of the games, a move that some have said did not go far enough.