Analysis Still Ongoing, US Has Not Confirmed China's Ability to Collect Real-time Data from Spy Balloons

Confiscation of Chinese spy balloons by the US Navy. (Wikimedia Commons/US Navy/Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Tyler Thompson)

JAKARTA - The United States administration under President Joe Biden said on Monday it could not confirm reports that China was able to collect real-time data from a spy balloon while flying over sensitive military sites earlier this year, saying analysis is still ongoing.

NBC News on Monday reported that China's blimp was able to transmit data back to Beijing in real-time, despite the US government's attempts to prevent it.

NBC cited two senior current United States Government officials and one former senior administration official.

The White House and the Pentagon told reporters they could not confirm the report. The Pentagon said experts were still analyzing debris collected from the balloon after it was shot down on February 4.

"I cannot confirm that there is any real-time transmission from the balloon back to (China) at this time," said Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh.

"That is something we are currently analyzing."

Meanwhile, China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing and the Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Reuters on this matter.

The blimp, which Beijing denies is a government spy plane, flew for a week over the United States and Canada before the US military shot it down off the Atlantic Coast on President Biden's orders.

Reuters reported that US officials believed the blimp was controlled by Beijing and was capable of maneuvering as it flew over the United States, sometimes turning left or right.

At the time, however, US officials downplayed the blimp's impact on national security, saying they were taking steps to limit its ability to collect information on sensitive US sites.

They also play down the idea the balloons are far more capable of gathering information than Chinese spy satellites, while acknowledging their ability to hover over US locations longer than satellites.

This event caused an uproar in Washington and prompted the US military to look for other objects in the sky that were not caught by radar.

The FBI has led the analysis since the United States said it had successfully completed recovery efforts in South Carolina to collect sensors and other debris from a suspected Chinese reconnaissance balloon on February 17.