Commercial cyber spying offers rich payoff Associated Press Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Updated 11:35 pm, Tuesday, February 19, 2013 BEIJING (AP) — For state-backed cyber spies such as a Chinese military unit implicated by a U.S. security firm in a computer crime wave, hacking foreign companies can produce high-value secrets ranging from details on oil fields to advanced manufacturing technology. A state-owned energy company in a bidding war for access to oil and gas fields abroad can save huge sums if it can find out what foreign rivals are willing to pay. "There are a lot of hackers that are sponsored by the Chinese government who conduct cyber attacks," said Lim Jong-in, dean of Korea University's Graduate School of Information Security. Last year, a group of Chinese state companies were among defendants charged in U.S.