Seeking spies, NASA locks out foreigners

A vintage logo for NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.NASA

NASA has locked its facilities to foreigners, disabled online research databases and ordered a complete review of access by foreign nationals to its facilities, as allegations swirled of foreign spies within the space agency.

The reports came to a head this weekend with the arrest of former contract worker Bo Jiang as he was leaving the country with a one-way ticket to China -- carrying several data storage devices, including hard drives, flash drives and computers that likely contained sensitive information.

- NASA administrator Charles Bolden

In testimony Wednesday before Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that funds the space agency, NASA chief Charles Bolden said associate administrator Robert Lightfoot would head a complete investigation into the issue. External investigations would likely follow.

We dont anticipate having a Chinese visitor to a NASA facility any time soon, he said.

Ive ordered a complete review of the access that foreign nationals are granted at NASA facilities, Bolden said. Within a week we probably will ask [the National Academy of Public Administration] to do an external review, he added.

Jiang was far from the only foreign national working in NASA facilities around the country. There are 281 foreign nationals with physical access to the agencys facilities including 192 Chinese nationals, he said.

The number of U.S. citizens working in Chinese facilities?

To my knowledge, we have no NASA personnel who are working in the Peoples Republic of China, Bolden said.

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Seeking spies, NASA locks out foreigners

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