Chinese Agency Linked To Cyber-Espionage Operations Will Review Source Code of Foreign Firms (bleepingcomputer.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: According to a new law voted in 2016 and which came into effect starting June 1, 2017, foreign companies activating in China could be forced to provide access to their source code to a state agency that has been recently linked to China's nation-state cyber-espionage campaigns. China's new cyber-security law (CSL) gives the China Information Technology Evaluation Center (CNITSEC) the legal power to conduct "national security reviews" of foreign companies that want to activate on the Chinese market. According to articles in the CSL, this also includes the power to request access to any app or service's source code. Chinese authorities say this is to protect citizens by searching the source code of foreign companies for secret mechanisms that collect data on Chinese users and send it to foreign servers.

Comments

Re:Listen up software companies

[ShanghaiBill]

I would be happy to buy lifetime guarantee products from the US instead of the chicom trash

I would be happy to buy products with open source, regardless of where they are manufactured.

Re:Listen up software companies

[Swave An deBwoner]

Doing so would entail substantial financial risk for the Trump business conglomerate:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-02/ivanka-trump-s-china-sewn-line-turns-profit-at-a-political-cost

http://www.businessinsider.com/ivanka-trump-clothing-line-made-in-china-hong-kong-2017-2

Read between the lines.

[Gravis Zero]

Chinese authorities say this is to protect citizens by searching the source code of foreign companies for secret mechanisms that collect data on Chinese users and send it to foreign servers.

What they really want is for the mechanisms to be on Chinese servers so that they can have access to all your information on their own citizens, lest one of them have some wrongthink.

Re:Listen up software companies

[Penguinisto]

This, right here. If its open source, there's nothing to try and steal.

I am curious, though - what's to stop companies from telling China to piss off, and instead "activate" in India, Vietnam, Taiwan ("...because fuck you Beijing, that's why"), etc... It's not like China has a monopoly on cheap labor (or even on untapped markets...)