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Several Western Govts. Ban Lenovo Equipment From Sensitive Networks
renai42 writes "If you've been in the IT industry for a while, you'll know that Lenovo's ThinkPad brand has a strong reputation with large organisations for quality, dating back to the brand's pre-2005 ownership by IBM. However, all that may be set to change with the news that the defence agencies of key Western governments such as Australia, the US, Britain, Canada and New Zealand have banned Lenovo gear from being used in sensitive areas, because of concerns that the Chinese vendor has been leaving back doors in its devices for the Chinese Government. No evidence has yet been presented to back the claims, but Lenovo remains locked out of sensitive areas of these governments. Is it fearmongering? Or is there some legitimate basis for the ban?"
Thinkpads are very popular with people who need to do their own maintenance. They use them on the ISS for that very reason. Every part is replaceable and you can download a full service manual with excellent step-by-step illustrated instructions.
Sounds like fear of the boogyman and a bit of racism are really going to hurt the US in the long run.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
So I wonder which manufacturer that doesn't use Chinese components they'll use instead?
Costs are higher, but Americans are being employed and paid with tax money. Sounds like a better approach than shipping it directly to someone else's economy.
The new cold war will be electronic and China has already proven that they are willing to do whatever is necessary to stay ahead there.
This isn't racism, this is a forward looking policy that's saying when, not if but when, we start finding Chinese backdoors in our equipment, they won't be in our sensitive areas.
The down side is that even if our equipment says made in the USA, it means assembled. Most of the parts will have been manufactured in China.
Well now, it's been my keen observation over the years that people suspect of others the same nefarious behaviour that they indulge in themselves or would do given the opportunity. I am sure that there exist proposals to have Cisco/Juniper/Akami network gear do more than is advertised.
Knowing that the West intelligence services would do (are doing??) what Lenovo & Huawei are suspected of is enough to have those companies banned, at least in CIA/NSA thinking.
It's difficult enough to keep malware out of the network as it is without providing an easy doorway.
eg: stuxnet
However, if evaluation of the policy to ban Lenovo were up to me, I would do a serious risk evaluation and compare Lenovo to others such as Dell. Truth is that state sponsored malware could be introduced at many levels including embedded firmware in say, network or video chipsets.
I suspect that the multinational component sourcing makes banning Lenovo analogous to plugging a small hole in a screen door while leaving all the windows open.
We dispense of the messy and "expensive" tasks of manufacturing and delegate to the lowest cost labor force. Makes sense untill one needs to be able to defend oneself. Once war does not make financial sense, we might be OK. Not sure if we can count on that though.
However if the Chinese are ever coming for the USA, it will be through the courts with a small army of debt collectors.
Cute sound bite but the US has the Chinese over a barrel here. China has bought about $1.1 trillion dollars of US debt which is about 9% of total US debt. (Japan has a similar amount an total foreign debt obligations are around $5.8 tillion) Most of this debt was purchased to maintain the yuan's peg to the dollar in order to keep their exports cheap. (a weak currency helps exports) Exactly how do you propose the Chinese force the US to pay? The courts can't force the US government to do a thing. They can't sell the debt to someone else. No one else wants or could buy that much debt. If they let their currency get stronger (buys more dollars per yuan) then it hurts their exports by making them more expensive abroad. Since their economy is heavily export based, any action they could take carries a strong probability of badly damaging their economy. No the Chinese are in a tough spot. They have lent a lot of money to the US to keep their currency cheap and to ward off currency speculators. There is no way they could collect in a short time without a mushroom cloud appearing over their economy.
When you owe the bank a little money, you have a problem. When you owe the bank a lot of money, the bank has a problem.
I'll make this one easy on you
Gee thanks. I'm really glad I have you to explain this to me since I merely have a master's degree in finance and am a certified accountant with 10 years experience in global sourcing. Good thing I have smart people like you to explain how currency trading works. [/sarcasm]
Defaulting on even a small amount of debt to China would collapse this system and US and world economy would not survive the fallout
The US doesn't have to default on the debt. That was the whole point. China will get paid in due time and they have very little leverage over the US regarding when and how. China bought that much US debt because they had to, not because they particularly wanted to. The notion that China now "owns" the US, or that they could take the US to some court over the matter is just nonsense. China (probably rightly) regards US debt as a safe investment but the China is in a much more precarious position than the US even without the exercise of some fiscal nuclear option.