Alyssa Liu: US Figure Skater Targeted by Chinese Espionage at Olympics

MILAN, Italy – As Alysa Liu prepares to compete for a gold medal in the individual women’s figure skating event at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, a previously undisclosed chapter in her journey to the Games has come to light: a targeted spying operation by the Chinese government prior to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

The operation, revealed in recent reporting, centered on Liu and her father, Arthur Liu, a Chinese refugee who fled the country decades ago following his involvement in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. According to reports, the Chinese government viewed Arthur Liu’s past activism as a potential source of political disruption and targeted both him and his daughter for surveillance and attempted intelligence gathering.

In November 2021, Matthew Ziburis, one of five individuals recently charged with spying on Chinese dissidents in the United States, allegedly contacted Arthur Liu impersonating a U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) official. Ziburis reportedly requested their passport numbers, a pretext for gathering personal information to be passed on to Chinese authorities, according to the Associated Press.

Ziburis then traveled to the Bay Area of California, where the Liu family resided, to conduct surveillance and attempt to elicit further private information. Arthur Liu expressed concerns at the time that the operation was intended to intimidate the family into refraining from any political commentary or criticism of human rights violations in China. He also voiced fears for his daughter’s safety.

The U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI intervened, providing protection to Liu and her family. Liu described meeting with an FBI agent at a local Japanese restaurant, expressing both curiosity and gratitude for the agent’s function. “I went like to eat dinner with her a couple times I mostly talk, given that like, I’m also like, really interested in what she does,” Liu said. “You know, and I mean, like not many people can do that. So I, you know, I have so many questions and like I’ve met with, like a psychologist there, not for me like because, I was like, so curious about like what she does.”

Despite the unsettling experience, Liu proceeded to compete in the 2022 Beijing Olympics, bolstered by heightened security assurances from the U.S. State Department and the USOPC. She was escorted at all times by at least two security personnel during her time in Beijing.

Liu has acknowledged the surreal nature of the situation, describing it as “a little bit freaky and exciting.” She even speculated about the possibility of her life story being adapted into a film, with a preference for portraying her father’s experiences as the central focus. “They gotta build me look like super cool hero or something,” she said. “But Honestly, I would just have the main focus be like my dad’s story, because like his story is so cool and like also just like everything that only happened because of what he did, so, like I feel like we got to start with the roots.”

Now, at the 2026 Milan Cortina Games, Liu is a key contender for a gold medal, having helped the U.S. Team secure gold in the team event. She currently stands in contention after a strong short program performance on Tuesday, landing a difficult triple Lutz-triple loop combination. She will compete against Japanese rivals Ami Nakai and Kaori Sakamoto for the individual title.