The White House’s top China specialist has confirmed Beijing is building “digital dossiers” on millions of people globally and says the database exposed last month by a consortium of international journalists is only a small part of this campaign.

Matt Pottinger, the Deputy National Security Adviser to President Donald Trump, used a speech on Saturday (Australian time) to call out China’s digital surveillance campaign and its efforts to “intimidate”, “blackmail” and “influence” foreign citizens.