Cameras on British Navy Drones Were Sending Data to China. Vessels Were Preparing a Mission in Hormuz

Cameras on unmanned K3 Scout vessels, which the British Royal Marines have been using since March, were regularly sending signals to an IP address in China. The Defence Ministry disconnected all internet connectivity from the cameras after the discovery was revealed. The Telegraph newspaper reported this. The Telegraph ↗

The fleet, worth approximately 12 million pounds, was to be part of Britain's contribution to a mission to protect freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz. According to the newspaper's defence source, preparations for operations in the Persian Gulf were being conducted on these devices. The Telegraph ↗

However, what is most important about this case is not what was leaked. The department maintains that nothing was. What matters is how deep in the supply chain the Chinese component was found: in a camera that the British manufacturer bought from a third party and which the supplier marked as compliant with the American defence standard NDAA. The Telegraph ↗

A Signal That Transmitted Nothing, Yet Still Mattered

The cameras were sending so-called heartbeat communication, that is, an automatic confirmation that the device is online and functioning normally. The content of such a signal is trivial. The problem is its direction: it was aimed at a server in China instead of remaining within the approved network. GB News ↗

The Defence Ministry stated that it had discovered the issue during a "routine assessment of cybersecurity vulnerabilities" of the unmanned vessel subsystem from Kraken Technology Group. "Thorough investigation found no evidence that anyone had accessed, compromised, or transmitted Ministry data or systems," a department spokesman said. GB News ↗

Shadow Minister for Security Alicia Kearns responded sharply. "If we cannot say with certainty what is inside our own military equipment, we cannot say it is ours or that we are sovereign," she said. The Conservatives also called on the government to urgently check its equipment for hidden Chinese traces. The Telegraph ↗

The British newspaper also reported that the vessels moved in close proximity to sensitive briefings of senior Special Boat Service officers at the Poole base and that the cameras could have remained active even after the drone itself was switched off. This is a claim from the newspaper's sources, not an official confirmation, and cannot be independently verified. The Telegraph ↗

British firm Kraken Technology Group stated that the cameras from a third party met the American NDAA standard and contained "a small number of components sourced outside the United Kingdom". Following an audit with the Royal Navy, it is convinced that no sensitive information left the intended channels. The Telegraph ↗

A Verification That Did Not Go Deep Enough

It is precisely this invocation of compliance with the NDAA standard that shows the limits of such verification. If the certification concerned mainly the supplier and not the full depth of his sub-supplier chain, the case reveals a blind spot in procurement: a device can be formally in order and simultaneously contain a component that opens a channel outward.

The British government, meanwhile, is investing five billion pounds in drone technologies and promising procurement that will be "shamelessly pro-British". The Telegraph draws from the case the conclusion that Chinese dominance in the supply chain survives even where technology is sold as British. The Telegraph ↗

This is not the first time London has had to deal with security risks from Chinese technologies. In 2020 it excluded Huawei from its 5G network, and in early July of this year the Defence Ministry banned Chinese electric vehicles at the Special Boat Service base. The Telegraph ↗

The Same Mechanism, Different Infrastructure

In May, the European Commission decided to gradually exclude Chinese solar inverters from projects financed with Union funds. This is not an outright ban, but a financing condition. The first transition deadline is 1 November 2026, with a stricter phase for new contracts beginning in April 2027. Euronews ↗

An unnamed Commission official spoke at the time of "serious economic and cybersecurity risks", with the assessment based on both classified and public materials from several member states. According to Brussels, inverters are the "brain" of electrical grids and the high-risk countries it listed were China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. Euronews ↗

The logic is the same in both cases. It is not about proof that the device is currently spying. It is about the fact that it has a communications or software element outside the full control of whoever bought it.

Why This Is Not Just a British Problem

The K3 Scout was not just purchased by the British Navy. According to The Telegraph, it was also bought by U.S. Special Operations Command and the vessel participated in NATO tests in the Baltic Sea. If such a platform were to end up in joint alliance missions, it would cease to be an internal British matter. The Telegraph ↗

The Slovak context arrived coincidentally shortly before. In late July, President Peter Pellegrini met with China's premier in Beijing and saw room for cooperation, among other things, in technologies and automakers. ta3 ↗ The SME newspaper then recalled that the Union was simultaneously warning against Chinese technologies. SME ↗

No direct connection to the British case follows from this. The British case is about military procurement, not civil economic cooperation. The Slovak example rather shows the political background in which debate about Chinese technologies is conducted in our country.

The broader regional background is complemented by the Czech Republic. There, a court case against a man suspected of Chinese espionage has been running, which the Supreme Court decided on in early August. While unrelated to supply chains, it shows that the topic of Chinese intelligence interest is not abstract in the region. iROZHLAS ↗

See also: [Canadian intern of Chinese origin detained on suspicion of spying at NATO headquarters](/article/canadian-intern-of-chinese-origin-detained-on-suspicion-of-spying-at-nato-1276579)

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