Communist Party Talent Program Spots Former Microsoft Researchers Now Working in China’s AI Industry

A Chinese Communist Party (CCP) recruitment program has hired former Microsoft researchers, including those currently working in China’s artificial intelligence (AI) industry, according to an investigation by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The “Thousand Talents Program” is China’s largest talent recruitment program that aims to poach U.S.-educated scientists and engineers for the CCP. U.S. national security agencies have raised alarm over the program, saying it is being used to steal intellectual property and technology to advance Chinese military and economic goals.

By reviewing Chinese-language news reports, the DCNF identified six former Microsoft researchers who were recruited by the CCP’s Thousand Talents Plan and now work at Chinese companies and universities. Five of the six currently work in China’s AI industrial complex, the DCNF found.

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Microsoft did not respond to DCNF’s request for comment.

China is racing to keep up with the United States in the competition to produce increasingly powerful AI systems that can be used in both commercial and military applications, according to The New York Times. Despite pressure from the CCP for companies in the country to catch up with the United States, China is a year or more behind in AI development and is using any American technology it can get its hands on to try to fill the gap.

As former senior CIA official William Hannas told The New York Times, more than 10,000 scientists were recruited under the program.

“This isn’t just some old recruiting program that recruits and trains technologists, as you would in America,” Geoffrey Cain, an author and journalist who has spent a decade investigating Microsoft in China, told the DCNF. “This is a project run by the Communist Party to ensure China’s technological supremacy over the Western liberal democratic world.”

Microsoft has solidified its position as an industry leader in the race to create increasingly powerful and useful AI-powered products by partnering with OpenAI and incorporating AI into its existing offerings, such as a search engine and word processor, according to The Wall Street Journal.

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“If (China) becomes the world leader in AI, that would be a nightmare scenario, including for the Chinese,” Conor Healy, director of government research at security and surveillance research group IPVM, told DCNF. “Just ask the Uyghurs, 10 million of whom live in an open-air prison in Xinjiang that has been automated by surveillance technology.”

“Hiding your head in the sand”

Microsoft boasted in a 2016 press release that 20 graduates of its Asian research institute, Microsoft Research Asia, had been selected to join the Thousand Talents Program. Through Chinese-language press reports, the DCNF identified six prominent former Microsoft researchers who joined CCP’s Thousand Talents Program, working for Chinese companies and universities.

For example, computer scientist Zhang Zheng worked at Microsoft Research Asia from 2001 to 2014, eventually becoming vice president. Zheng has also been described as an expert in AI, according to Chinese news site ScienceNet. In 2016, Chinese news site Caixin named Zheng a national “expert” in the Thousand Talents Program.

Zheng was appointed director of Amazon Web Services’ Shanghai Artificial Intelligence Lab in 2018 and is currently listed as a professor of computer science at New York University Shanghai. Zheng did not respond to DCNF’s request for comment.

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In another case, Li Shipeng worked at Microsoft as a “research area manager/principal researcher” from 1999 to 2015 before becoming vice president of voice recognition technology company iFlytek. The U.S. government imposed sanctions on iFlytek in 2019 for its role in the oppression of Uyghur Muslims in China’s Xinjiang province.

According to The South China Morning Post, in 2017, China’s Ministry of Science and Technology named iFlytek among three other companies that are leaders in the field of artificial intelligence.

Shipeng is described as a Thousand Talents “expert” in a biography written on the China Computer Federation forum in 2018, which was translated by DCNF. The biography also claims that Shipeng holds 196 U.S. patents. Shipeng is currently executive chairman of the Shenzhen Institute of Artificial Intelligence and Robotics for Society in China. The institute did not respond to requests for comment from DCNF. Shipeng could not be reached for comment.

Ya-Qin Zhang worked at Microsoft from 1999 to 2014, serving as founder and president of Microsoft Asia-Pacific Research and Development Group from 2006. Zhang then headed technology company Baidu as president from 2014 to 2019. Zhang was recruited under the Thousand Talents Program during his time at Baidu, Chinese news outlets Jiemian and China News Service reported.

Zhang serves as dean of the AI ​​Industry Research Institute at Tsinghua University in China. Zhang did not respond to requests for comment.

Zhang’s previous company, Baidu, was pushing to become a top AI contender when he worked there. Baidu’s former COO Qi Lu worked at the company from January 2017 to June 2018 and encouraged the company to get into AI, Wired reported. Lu previously worked at Microsoft from 2009 to 2016.

Former Microsoft Research Asia employee Wen Jirong later became president of Elensdata, a technology company focused on developing AI, according to the company’s website. Elensdata’s website identifies Jirong and other founding team members as Thousand Talents Program experts and notes Jirong’s experience working on AI at Microsoft. The website also says Jirong holds 50 U.S. patents.

Jirong is a professor and executive dean of the Gaoling School of Artificial Intelligence at Renmin University of China. Jirong did not respond to requests for comment.

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Microsoft Research Asia employed Zhang Hongjiang from 1999 to 2011 before he went to work for Chinese internet software and services company Kingsoft, according to a 2018 Carlyle Group press release. Hongjiang joined the investment firm that same year as a senior adviser. Zhang was a research manager at HP Labs in Palo Alto, California, before joining Microsoft, according to a Carlyle press release.

Hongjiang was recruited by the Thousand Talents Program in 2012, shortly after leaving Microsoft, according to Chinese news site Brandcn. Hongjiang is currently listed as a distinguished visiting professor at Tsinghua University in China, where he is chairman of the Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence. Honjiang did not respond to DCNF requests for comment.

Chen Benfeng was selected in the 11th Thousand Talents Program in 2015, according to Chinese news outlet CNICN. Benfeng worked at Microsoft’s U.S. headquarters on the browser team, according to Sing Tao Daily.

Benfeng founded cybersecurity firm CloudDeep Technology in 2013 and is still listed there as an employee. CloudDeep did not respond to requests for comment, and Benfeng was not available for comment.

“Microsoft appears to have a strong interest in proactively preventing and monitoring this phenomenon, but it is not the only American corporation that is burying its head in the sand,” Healy told DCNF.

“Too close to a foreign enemy”

Microsoft has deep political ties to the Biden administration. Microsoft CEO Brad Smith has visited President Joe Biden’s White House at least 30 times as of February 2024. Smith’s visits came as Microsoft sought to shape the Biden administration’s artificial intelligence policy and as company executives poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into the president’s reelection campaign, according to Federal Election Commission records.

The tech giant and its subsidiaries spent millions lobbying the federal government in 2022 as it sought to keep the U.S. government as a huge buyer of its productivity software. Microsoft lobbied for 12 different bills to regulate AI in 2023, more than Google, Meta and Amazon, according to Open Secrets.

In that spirit, Microsoft promised in July 2023 that it would ensure AI research is “safe, secure, and trustworthy,” according to a company blog post.

“The fact that the Thousand Talents program is recruiting researchers from Microsoft is extremely alarming, as U.S. law enforcement and counterintelligence agencies have expressed concerns that the Thousand Talents program is being used to steal intellectual property and spy on Americans,” Cain told DCNF.

“This is what happens when a company gets too close to a foreign adversary,” Cain said. “Microsoft has implanted a huge amount of intellectual property and trade secrets in them that can be easily used against Americans.”

Originally published by Daily Caller News Foundation.

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