The Government was accused today of covering up a Chinese hack of the Foreign Office in the midst of the Beijing spy scandal.

In an audacious cyber attack just weeks after the prosecution of two alleged spies for Bejiing collapsed, Chinese hackers targeted government servers to access thousands of confidential Home Office visa application records held by the Foreign Office.

The hack happened in October, but details only emerged today as ministers were accused of hushing up the unprecedented attack to prevent further embarrassment following a furore over the espionage case being dropped when Government advisers refused to call Beijing a national security threat.

The latest attack will raise questions about the decision of Sir Keir Starmer to make a historic visit to China next month to strengthen economic ties with Beijing despite growing security concerns.

He will be the first British prime minister to travel there since Theresa May in 2018.

The group responsible, known as Storm-1849, is a China-linked espionage outfit identified by Western agencies as part of Beijing’s state-aligned hacking apparatus.

Sir Keir Starmer is expected to travel to Beijing in January. He is pictured with President Xi Jinping at the G20 summit in November 2024

The group has been accused of targeting politicians, parliamentary staff and organisations critical of the Chinese government, using phishing emails and cloud access to harvest sensitive political information.

Storm-1849 was named publicly in March 2024 when the Government formally blamed China for cyber attacks on MPs and the Electoral Commission.

The UK’s election watchdog said it took three years and £250,000 to recover from the hack, in which details of 40 million voters were accessed by Beijing’s spies.

The latest attack has raised concerns that China may be targeting visa details of Hong Kong passport holders and dissidents who had fled the UK.

It comes as ministers are under pressure over plans for a new ‘superembassy’ in central London.

Today, Business minister Sir Chris Bryant insisted the Government was ‘very confident that in the investigation that we’ve done so far, that nobody, no individual will have been harmed or compromised by what has happened’.

He cited a number of recent cyber attacks by Russia and others saying: ‘We’ve been engaged in an investigation since October, just as with [Jaguar Land Rover] and M&S, and the British Library and a whole series of other cyber attacks, it does take some time to get to the bottom of precisely what has happened.’

But Shadow Security Minister Alicia Kearns accused Labour of covering up the details ahead of the Prime Minister’s visit.

She said: ‘The Government has deliberately covered up a hack on confidential data by a Chinese agency to smooth the way for the Prime Minister’s upcoming jolly to Beijing, and to avoid further embarrassment after the collapse of the Chinese espionage case in Parliament.

‘Despite countless episodes of hostile Chinese interference in our democracy and society, Labour continues to claim we have to accept this pain to foster economic growth.

‘Labour have tanked the economy and created a consequence-free operating space for China’s intelligence services in the misguided hope of curing their self-inflicted economic woes.’

Luke de Pulford, co-founder of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, warned: ‘Efforts to downplay or contain the fallout in order to avoid embarrassing Beijing only compound the damage and undermine public confidence.

‘If visa application data was among the material accessed, the implications are especially grave, given the potential risks to dissidents and others who rely on the UK for protection. We need urgent answers and some China realism from the UK leadership.’

Chinese hackers targeted government servers to access thousands of confidential Home Office visa application records held by the Foreign Office

In October MI5 chief Sir Ken McCallum warned of ‘escalating’ state threats against Parliament, universities and the UK’s critical infrastructure including hacks and espionage by Beijing.

Ministers have been accused of cosying up to China with a series of visits.

David Lammy travelled to Beijing and Shanghai in October last year as then Foreign Secretary, followed by Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, in January to seek greater economic cooperation with the world’s second largest economy.

David Miliband, the Energy Secretary, visited China in March 2025 for climate and energy talks followed by Jonathan Powell, the Prime Minister’s national security adviser, in July and November.

Earlier this week, the intelligence and security committee questioned whether security concerns were being ‘overlooked in favour of economic considerations’.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former Tory leader, said: ‘They know very well who has done this. It’s China. The reason they won’t say is because they have this absurd nonsense of Keir Starmer going over to visit China next year.

‘China is playing us for idiots. We look foolish and pathetic that we cannot even call out a hack.’