Philippine Lawmakers Worry China Telecom May Be a 'Trojan horse' (reuters.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: Opposition members of the Philippine Congress raised concern on Wednesday that China Telecom Corp, which may enter the Philippine industry, could be a "Trojan horse" aimed at giving China access to state secrets. The Southeast Asian country aims to name a third telecom operator within the first quarter that will break the duopoly of PLDT and Globe Telecom State-run China Telecom has been named as a possible investor in that third entity. President Rodrigo Duterte, who has warned both PLDT and Globe to shape up or face competition, has welcomed Chinese entities specifically to become the third telecoms operator. Beijing has selected China Telecom to invest in the Philippines, according to Philippine officials, but it would need to partner with a local company as it cannot operate alone under the law. China Telecom's presence in the Philippines, however, does not sit well with some lawmakers, given China's telecommunications expertise and sophisticated technology.

Comments

Re:What about american software?

[burtosis]

At this point I suspect most closed source software of being a Trojan horse.

Encryption

[DrYak]

If you're worried about *an infrastructure provider* putting your state secret at risk, then there's a high chance that you're doing encryption wrong.

- use server encryption (communication between you and the server are over sopme form of SSL like HTTPS, nobody else along the line can access them)
- use end-to-end encryption (you encrypt your message before sending it, the recipient decrypts it after receiving, even the server doesn't have any idea what you're saying)
- use onion routing (hard for an external observer to guess who is communicating with whom).

Combin those depending on the needed protection.

America isn't actively trying to steal land there

[Zontar_Thing_From_Ve]

China is. Look up the South China Sea disputes. China and the Philippines have an ongoing major dispute about various territories there. If America steals their secrets, they aren't going to use that to gain a military advantage over the Philippines because they are security allies and the USA has no territorial claims in the disputed area. China, on the other hand, could use secret information to their advantage.

Re:America isn't actively trying to steal land the

[plague911]

Everyone is stealing everything. The US,China,Russia,Germany,UK etc etc etc are all doing their best to get ahold of every bit of information they can from everyone they can. It is childlike naivete to think anyone is not in this game. At BEST you can control WHO gets the information. Choose American made, the American's get your info easily, Choose Russian tech, the Russians AND Americans get your info, Choose Chinese tech the Chinese, Russians, Americans AND everyone including even your pet chicken get your information.

Re: Honestly

[slashrio]

The Philippines is to China what Granada and Panama are to the USA: for the taking.
There's no war coming. Merely an invasion if you don't give them what they want.