In July 2008, a phone call came to Nanjing Jinxian Gold Foil Factory: "Aren't your gold foil paper already sold privately and publicly? Sell it to me cheaper, and you won't suffer any loss!"
heard this After saying this, the factory director's previously relaxed expression immediately became panicked. He had no idea about private sales.
You must know that gold foil manufacturing technology is a state secret, and the entire factory has signed a confidentiality agreement.
The factory director could already hear his own beating heartbeat. After a few seconds, the factory director who calmed down responded to the buyer: "Where did you see us trading privately before? We haven't seemed to trade like this recently. ? "After
set out some information, in order to prevent the buyer from noticing anything strange, the factory director responded to the buyer: "We are no longer doing business this month. We will notify you when the new black gold paper comes out!"
After hanging up the phone, the factory director knew that this matter was not trivial. The state secrets of gold foil forging technology had been leaked.
Since it is a state secret, why does gold foil paper appear on the black market without permission?
Intangible cultural heritage technology leaked
After Li Jinxiang of Nanjing Gold Thread Gold Foil Factory hung up the phone with the channel dealer, he sent his men to inquire about the source of supply of black gold paper.
Originally, Li Jinxiang thought that the channel dealer who called him was just looking for cheap and wanted to get some discounts from him.
did not expect that it would be this phone call that would unveil China's unprecedented intangible cultural heritage technology leak case.
As a tool for making gold foil, the production process of black gold paper has been kept secret since ancient times.
When making gold foil, the function of black gold paper is to separate the gold foils and prevent them from adhering to each other, ensuring the best quality of the gold foils.
Gold foil has been made in China for 2,000 years, and Nanjing was the first place where gold foil was made.
In ancient times, ordinary people could not afford gold foil paper, and most of it was used by the Tianjia as a material for templesgilding and building decoration.
Gold foil paper, which is forged through complicated processes, is as thin as a cicada's wings, extremely malleable, and made of pure gold. Compared with other materials, it has a longer shelf life and is more popular among wealthy people.
In modern times, black gold paper is widely used in all walks of life, and some companies use gold foil to make trademarks.
To make gold into gold foil, twelve processes are required, including stripping, layering, leaf beating, and dipping. Some of these steps must be completed manually.
This technology has been passed down to this day, although there are some interruptions in the process. But in 2005, the gold foil forging technique has become a national intangible cultural heritage.
China's gold foil manufacturing industry has begun to rise again, and China has gradually become the world's major gold foil exporting country.
The profits created by China's gold foil exceeded 200 million in 2008, accounting for 60% of the world.
Therefore, Wujin paper, which is closely related to the gold foil forging process, is also a state secret. In 2006, it became a project of the National Security Bureau .
The Nanjing Gold Thread Gold Foil Factory led by Li Jinxiang is the only management unit of this technology.
Subsequently, the employees of the gold foil factory got the black gold paper with a clearly marked price from the market without much effort. The black gold paper sold outside by
is the same as the black gold paper from Nanjing Jinxian Gold Foil Factory, both in material and form.
Factory director Li Jinxiang immediately called the police and sent the obtained black gold paper to Nanjing University for inspection along with the products from the factory.
The test result given by Nanjing University is that the high imitation black gold paper on the market uses the same process procedures and the proportion of raw materials added as the original.
Internal and external investigation
After receiving the news, the State Secrets Bureau immediately formed a case handling team with experts from the Nanjing Municipal Public Security Bureau and the National Ministry of Science and Technology.
The Nanjing Xiaguan District Procuratorate is responsible for hearing the case. The experienced prosecutors concluded that the leak of state secrets was most likely committed by an insider.
Because there was no abnormality in the gold foil factory, and the surveillance footage also showed that there was no theft or entry into the gold foil factory.
In order not to alert the perpetrators and make the perpetrators wary, they stopped temporarily. The task force decided not to find out the insider in a hurry, but to start with the black gold paper from the outside.
After investigating the black gold paper on the market, the investigation team quickly discovered that most of these black gold papers were traded near Longtan Garden in Qixia District, Nanjing.
However, this area was specially designated for the production of gold foil at that time. There were countless retail investors and merchants who made gold foil.
If the spy places the manufacturing plant here, the difficulty of the investigation can be imagined, and it will undoubtedly be like finding a needle in a haystack. Members of the
task force pretended to be buyers of black gold paper, intending to find clues from the supplier of black gold paper.
A month passed, and finally a seller contacted them, so the task force followed the lead and noticed a paper mill in Jurong City.
Jurong is a county-level city under Nanjing. Most of the city is developing tourism and tourism, and there are many mountains and hills.
There is a dilapidated school on Tongshan, Baohua Town, Jurong City. According to the testimony of nearby residents, an unknown person bought the school and turned it into a paper mill.
Most of the Wujin paper sold on the market is provided by this paper factory. Residents near
also said that there is indeed something strange about this paper mill. There are several big wolfdogs guarding the gate, and outsiders are not welcome to visit.
And they have never met Xu, the owner of this paper mill.
Subsequently, members of the task force asked a black gold paper buyer who was already an undercover agent to take the initiative to contact Xu.
Looking at the business coming to his door, Xu readily agreed to the black gold paper buyer. When
originally thought that everything was going according to plan, the investigators did not expect that Xu was so cautious.
Xu proposed that the price of each pack of black gold paper is 1,800 yuan. If he wants to get the goods, the time and place must follow his rules.
In order not to arouse Xu’s wariness, members of the task force decided to agree to all Xu’s requests.
Xu set the delivery location in Qixia District, Nanjing City, paying the money and delivering the goods.
But when the agreed time and place arrived, Boss Xu disappeared and was nowhere to be seen.
The investigators thought their identities had been revealed, so they cautiously called Boss Xu.
Unexpectedly, Boss Xu on the other end of the phone didn't move at all, saying that this time he just wanted to see their sincerity.
was relieved when he found out that Boss Xu was not aware of the task force's true identity.
During the phone call, Boss Xu agreed on the time and place of the next transaction, and said that he would definitely go this time.
The investigators who responded readily could only accept Boss Xu's arrangement and arrive at the next transaction location.
But Boss Xu still didn’t show up, saying that he changed the transaction time again just to be on the safe side.
After using this method four times, Boss Xu’s figure finally caught the eye of the investigators at the entrance of the Nanjing Vehicle Management Office.
However, Boss Xu did not stay too long after receiving the money, and the members of the task force only glanced at him.
did not alert the members of Xu’s task force. They remained stationary and continued to closely monitor the paper mill.
Later, they sent the black gold paper they bought to Nanjing University for testing. The results showed that there was no difference between the black gold paper produced by Boss Xu and the black gold paper circulating in the market.
The Nanjing Municipal Public Security Bureau also locked the suspect at the Tongshan Paper Mill in Jurong City.After
external personnel investigated clearly, the police began to defeat the five technical backbones of Nanjing Jinxian Gold Foil Factory one by one. The five technical backbones of
are each in charge of a part of the data and have signed a confidentiality agreement. Logically speaking, it is impossible for the insider to completely reproduce the production process of Wujin Paper by his own efforts.
This time they need to quietly find out the insider and find out who is connected with Xu.
At the same time, during the surveillance of the Jurong Tongshan Paper Mill, the police investigated all personnel entering and leaving the paper mill.
's surveillance of the paper mill was not in vain. Soon the police discovered that there were two technicians who had close contacts with the Tongshan Paper Mill.
There is no doubt that it was these two technicians who leaked the production process of black gold paper for the purpose of seeking personal gain.
Sins brought by greed
In October 2008 , prosecutors from the Nanjing Xiaguan Procuratorate obtained an arrest warrant and wanted to seize both the person and the stolen goods.
On October 8th, the Nanjing Municipal Public Security Bureau launched an operation and brought a team of 30 people to the Tongshan Paper Mill.
The door of Tongshan Paper Mill was closed in broad daylight, and it looked like something was fishy.
Wu Jun, the director of the Procuratorate's Anti-Corruption Bureau, personally led the team, claiming that he wanted to check the immigrant population and ordered the paper mill to open its doors.
At this time, Lu, a technician who was busy in the paper mill, didn't know it. He thought that although it was rare for the police to check on immigrants, it was not non-existent, so he did not stop him. After
entered the paper factory, Wu Jun quickly recognized Lu, who was instructing other workers on the production line, based on the information provided by the task force.
Wu Jun signaled the team members to launch an arrest operation, and the police who rushed into the paper mill immediately seized the stolen goods.
Another technician, Huang, took advantage of the chaos and fled the factory after hearing the news. The police did not capture him immediately.
However, Lu had no time to react and was immediately controlled. Lu's husband, Tao, was unaware of this and sat in his home waiting to be killed.
Soon after, Huang, who was on the run in fear of crime, was unable to escape under the police's dragnet, and the last perpetrator was also brought to justice.
The case of leaking state secrets has come to an end, but how did the two technical backbones of Nanjing Jinxian Gold Foil Factory embark on this road of no return?
As the technical backbone of the gold foil factory, Huang and Lu naturally knew the serious consequences of leaking state secrets.
The black gold paper manufacturing process is a key project under the care of the State Security Bureau, but Lu’s husband Tao is not willing to let his wife live a hard life keeping the secret.
After Lu signed the confidentiality agreement, Tao, who wanted to make a fortune from black gold paper, was very unhappy.
He didn't understand why his wife had to abide by the confidentiality agreement even though she had mastered this technology.
Both Tao and Lu work in the gold foil factory, but Tao is just a small warehouse manager and cannot be exposed to the entire process of making black gold paper.
But he was very clear about the wealth that black gold paper brought. Every time he saw black gold paper coming out of the warehouse, the gold foil factory would receive a large sum of money.
So Tao began to stalk his wife Lu, begging her to secretly bring out the black gold paper making skills.
At first, Lu did not agree with her husband's idea, but her position was not firm and she was easily persuaded by her husband. After
started this operation, she hid the information from the gold foil factory, slowly took out various information, and studied it privately with her husband.
But after all, there were five technicians under joint jurisdiction. Lu could only bring out an extremely limited part of the information without disturbing others. They also realized that this matter was definitely not something they could do.
Many private experiments all ended in failure, which made Tao very unconvinced.
So they planned to recruit another technician, Huang, thinking that with the power of three people, the possibility of complete replication would be much greater.
After five years, Huang and Lu actually completely reproduced the production process of Wujin paper without disturbing the other three technical backbones.
In 2007, the three people who successfully developed it were overjoyed. After discussion, the three people decided that Tao's brother would set up the factory. They chose Tongshan, a relatively remote place in Jurong, and announced it was a paper factory.
Huang and Lu usually work at Nanjing Jinxian Gold Foil Factory and rarely go to Tongshan.
Only when they encounter technical difficulties, the two have to set off to guide the workers on the production line.
Tao acted as a middleman, contacting buyers of black gold paper, and the mysterious boss Xu was none other than Tao.
Tao is still dreaming of getting rich. In more than a year, they produced more than 600 packages of black gold paper.
However, there are only more than 100 packages of black gold paper actually sold.
After excluding the machine and worker costs of the paper mill, the illegal profits obtained by the three were less than 150,000 yuan.
In May 2009, the court also formally sentenced the three people.
Lu leaked state secrets, but the court believed that Lu committed the crime under the instigation of her husband Tao and had a good attitude towards admitting his mistake. He was sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of 31 years and six months, with a two-year suspension.
Her husband Tao leaked state secrets and committed official embezzlement. The court sentenced him to two years in prison. The cracking of the
case successfully saved the gold foil manufacturing crisis related to Wujin Paper.
Although gold foil manufacturing originated in Nanjing, China, in modern times, the gold foil market was once crowded by other countries.
Before the 21st century, China's gold foil production was less than one percent of the world's.
It is precisely because of the improvement of gold foil technology related to black gold paper that my country's gold foil manufacturing industry has regained its vitality.
However, the two technical backbones obviously did not take the serious consequences of the leakage of the gold foil forging process to heart, so they embarked on this path of no return.
Once the production technology of black gold paper flows into other countries, it will inevitably have a huge impact on China's gold foil manufacturing industry.
Finally, I hope that no matter who we are, we can strictly guard state secrets.
-End-
References
China News Network: "The theft of 's unique black gold paper skills alarmed the National Security Bureau "
editor | Don't miss the little star
