US Accuses China, Taiwan Firms With Stealing Secrets From Chip Giant Micron (yahoo.com)

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced charges Thursday against Chinese and Taiwan companies for theft of an estimate $8.75 billion worth of trade secrets from US semiconductor giant Micron. From a report: Sessions said the case was the latest in a series that are part of a state-backed program by Beijing to steal US industrial and commercial secrets. "Taken together, these cases and many others like them paint a grim picture of a country bent on stealing its way up the ladder of economic development and doing so at American expense," Session said. "This behavior is illegal. It is wrong. It is a threat to our national security. And it must stop." The indictment released in the US district court in San Jose, California alleges that Chinese state-owned Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Co. and privately owned United Microelectronics Corporation of Taiwan, along with three UMC executives, conspired to steal Micron trade secrets to help UMC and Fujian Jinhua develop DRAM chips used in many computer processors. It said the three Taiwanese men -- Stephen Chen Zhengkun, He Jianting and Kenny Wang Yungming -- all previously worked at Micron and stole its technology when they joined UMC with the express purpose of transferring it to Fujian Jinhua, a two-year-old firm. Chen was originally a top executive at Micron, then moved to lead UMC, and subsequently became president of Fujian Jinhua.

Comments

Re: IT WAS RUSSIA

[Anonymous Coward]

It was several years ago, but Russia got caught infiltrating Cisco and eBay. Obama did nothing about it.

Oh great

[Anonymous Coward]

High RAM prices, but at least our government is working in our interest (or so they say).

Why didn't they patent

[Anonymous Coward]

I work for a company in the industry. When we receive InfoSec training, we are told that, unlike patents, trade secrets cannot be legally enforced. The only legal resource for trade secrets is confidentiality agreements with employees and contractors. Training tells us that it's fair game if a competitor by any means obtains a trade secret, as it ceases to be secret the moment it's shared. Weren't patents precisely invented to discourage trade secret keeping behavior? Can a trade secret be registered?

Re:Why didn't they patent

[swan5566]

If you are caught stealing trade secrets from a company, you can be sued for damages in civil court. Now if you develop those secrets independently, you're fine. If the company somehow publicly discloses a secret, then it's fair game as well.

Re:Why didn't they patent

[mangastudent]

Patents are indeed designed to provide strong enforcableblity advantages over trade secrets, plus advance the state of the art by publicly revealing your secret sauce. Worked wonders in Silicon Valley, e.g. company A would develop invention X, company B would realized X could be vastly improved with invention Y, they'd cross license and both and their customers would benefit.

But that'st not to say that trade secrets can't be enforced. Sure, if stealing company C were to broadcast to the wide world the secrets, they've lost their status as such, but why would they do that, instead of gaining advantage by keeping them secret inside the company? The theft of them is of course actionable, Micron has been suing these companies and I think individuals, and now the DoJ has decided the case has merit and is serious enough for them to step in.

Which will make things very sticky for UMC and any of the relevant employees in Taiwan, since they have the rule of law there, unlike the PRC. We can also enforce all sorts of penalties starting from the exit from the border of the PRC, and go further if the PRC thumbs their nose at us if the chips produced using these trade secrets are only used for the internal market.

Ultimately we really should revoke both the PRC's membership in the WTO and their Most Favored Nation Status, if they're not willing to play by the rules established for those, especially now that they're not really a developing nation. The American hating whataboutists should consider that acceptable behavior changes as you make such a transition.

Re:Why didn't they patent

[CanadianMacFan]

If by we you mean the US then I doubt the US is going to ask for China to be removed from the WTO since the US wants to leave the WTO themselves.

And China isn't the only country that doesn't play by the established rules when it's in their best interests. The US does this quite often, especially since Trump has come into office.

Re:Why didn't they patent

[Plus1Entropy]

Generally trade secrets are things that aren't patentable or worth patenting. They're usually highly esoteric, whereas patents are supposed to have utility beyond a single immediate application (or else it would be a very weak patent).

The classic example is the formula for Coca-Cola. It's not patentable because it likely doesn't have any novelty, but it's obviously highly valuable. And that value somewhat depends on it remaining a secret.

In fact, say Coca-Cola was able to, and did, patent their formula. Well, at that point it would become public knowledge that anyone with access to the USPTO site could lookup. While Coca-Cola would have the 20 year (or however long) exclusivity to the patent, that only restricts monetization. I could start making Coca-Cola in my bathtub, legally, immediately, as long as I don't sell it. Also anyone would be free to innovate on the recipe even while the patent is active.

Re:Why didn't they patent

[Anonymous Coward]

A tunneling microscope probe and xrays and lithium nicobate will reveal exactly how the chip was made. In the industry how it is made is no secret.
The valuable bit is YIELD - and good technique and pure raw ingredients. You do not want to scale up and promise supply if say you find out the Japanese stepper equipment need thermal stability mods. Yup, air conditioning can cost you.

Assuming you did steal/copy all the paperwork - you would see problems and cost takeoffs, and time to market. Success is only assured if you can solve some of these variables better than the other guy. AFAIK, Samsung takes a lot of beating.

Re:Why didn't they patent

[Anonymous Coward]

When we receive InfoSec training, we are told that, unlike patents, trade secrets cannot be legally enforced.

You are partially correct that it can't be directly legally enforced. However, the legal part exists and it only ties to the way the secret is disclosed, hint the word "secret".

Re:Why didn't they patent

[Anonymous Coward]

The classic example is the formula for Coca-Cola. It's not patentable because it likely doesn't have any novelty, but it's obviously highly valuable. And that value somewhat depends on it remaining a secret.

This whole secret formula thing is a marketing scam. The marketing around Coke and Pepsi is all designed to convince people that they are super special and not just water flavored with vanilla, cinnamon, etc, which anyone could make.

Any actual evidence this time?

[pablo_max]

The US seems to making many, many accusations against many, many countries without a single shred of evidence.
So far, it's been.... "trust us".
WMD in Iraq? Trust us! We need to go to war.
No go zones in the Netherlands? Trust us!
London is chaos on the streets? Trust us!
Regime change here and there needed? Trust us!

Just because I am "more likely" to believe the US than say, North Korea, doesn't mean that the current US regime is, in any conceivable way, trust worthy or believable.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

There was "some" evidence of WMD in Iraq. Bush lied about the nuclear program. The rest of your spiel is Fox News Breitbart retard shit, about "no go zones" and all that. Yes, there's evidence in this case that China had a massive campaign.

Stop playing whataboutism, it doesn't help you learn anything about this.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

Honour
Tradition
Authority
Hard work
Timeliness
Superiority
Arrogance
Decadence
Irrationality
Anger
Collapse

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

The best part is that no-one cares what you believe.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're being stupid and declining. Yes, China needed to steal trade secrets from some 20+ companies, or else they wouldn't have done it in a massive organized campaign for the purpose. What YOU think they "need" is irrelevant.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1106491/download?utm_medium=email

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't that precisely the behavior of the US at the start of the industrial age? What goes around comes around.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[hackingbear]

Yes, like this one... oh sorry, it pointed at the wrong direction.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL, they were caught red -handed. Here's some background from last summer for those obviously not following the story.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/22/technology/china-micron-chips-theft.html

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[DCFusor]

Yep, it's basically the definition of loser at least in my book. If it's always someone else's fault, you're a loser.
After a couple times, you know you should have seen whatever it was coming and strengthened yourself against it, if you don't...
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, shame on me.
Seeing a lot of "it's that other guy's fault" these days in politics. Losers all. Quitcher bitchin and fix it, losers.
I've been amazed that over the last few decades, no matter what bad thing - heck, if we "investigate it and appoint committiees" it's suddenly all OK, even though we didn't fix shit. I say fix the problem, not the blame, it's better.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

..."according to South China Morning Post, the state-controlled propaganda newspaper of China"

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[hackingbear]

South China Morning Post is a Hong Kong newspaper; maybe you are talking about CNN. :-)

Fair, you don't have to believe them; maybe they were making FAKE news. :-)

But you should read through all the documents in the Snowden leak to see for yourself if the source data are there.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

That article disregards the fact reverse engineering trade secrets is completely legal and invalidates their status as a secret. That is, if a single company somewhere in the world reversed Samsung/Micron's designs and methods and entered production, those designs and methods no longer fall under TRIPS's trade secrets definition.

This is why there so many patents in graphics. You'd otherwise have people picking up electron microscopes and copying the logic blocks. It's also why the firmwares are encrypted. Whatever can't be patented is put in the firmware and made hard to reverse.

It's similar but distinct from how the IBM PC was made into PC Compatible by Intel.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

This.. take a read : https://www.bloomberg.com/opin...

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[liquid_schwartz]

Yep, it's basically the definition of loser at least in my book. If it's always someone else's fault, you're a loser.

That sums up all of the aggrieved college majors and many a liberal.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

You must have read a different article than the one I posted, because they were actually caught red-handed stealing trade secrets.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[gweihir]

Obviously what I think is very relevant to you or you would not have bothered to answer. A nice failure on your part that provides a good estimator for your level of rationality.

Also, what makes you think China is spying because it needs to? I think it spies on US businesses because it is _easy_. Incidentally, the US does a lot of economic espionage as well and has been doing so for a long, long time, even if the NSA does not admit it openly. Does the US do that spying because it needs to?

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[gweihir]

Also most conservatives. Just look at the current moron-in-chief: Nothing is ever his fault.

People that recognize their mistakes and learn from them generally do not go into or care much about politics. Politics is a dirty and corrupted field because it does not care about facts, ethics and rationality, and at the same time lies egregiously about that. Unless the human race manages to overcome politics (and with that greed for power), it is what will kill it. I am not hopeful.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

“Good artists copy, great artists steal”

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please provide an example of the NSA performing industrial espionage.
I'm sure US companies would LOVE for the NSA to target foreign corporations and pass that info on to them - the US would crush the competition even harder. Hell, the NSA could fuck over most foreign corporations just by leaking stories about all their criminal activity - bribery, tax fraud, etc.

But it doesn't happen. I wonder why? Maybe the premise is wrong...
Nah, this is slashdot. "Hate the NSA" is one of the shibboleths here.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

What those devices contained was more valuable than gold or jewels: designs from an American company, Micron Technology, for microchips that have helped power the global digital revolution.

Is that what you mean or call it "reverse engineering" in China? Which school did you learn the meaning of the word from?

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

Naivety is such a wonderful thing.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[DCFusor]

I often agree with you gweihr, so I bothered to respond.
Um, he's just one guy, and anything but a dictionary conservative. Not "most conservatives". Most of whom don't like being lumped in with neocons (both parties' neocons are the war and bribe party), the wing-nut radicals (which both parties have), or the "in name only" sorts who say whatever to get elected and then do whatever their corporate sponsors tell them or whatever they think will bring home the pork or bring in the votes by whatever other method. No one seems to retire from Congress poor - even people in super poor districts live in super mansions "somehow". I can point to plenty of examples, I happen to know more from D but I suspect that's just a filter due to how I got my info. My experience of corruption is that it's very bipartisan indeed, and when the parties agree on something, you should run.
Which is why they never get around to turning over that rock - they're all under it themselves.
Guess I'm pushing my luck trying to use the dictionary definition of the word conservative here - just like the word "hacker" it's been utterly corrupted (hacker used to mean good with computers, now it means black hat, for example). Liberal, same deal...utterly not liberal nowdays. I'm more liberal than most self-identified liberals these days, but am a conservative! I don't tell people what to think, I do try to teach them HOW.
FWIW, the huge majority of the righties I know (and this is a hard-right county in SWVA) - simply were disgusted with DC and wanted it to burn down, which is why they voted for Trump. Not because they like him - and they like him less now, but with what the other guys have done, are going to vote for him again...because they've gotten worse quicker yet. Except for that Pai guy, who none of us can figure why he's not been fired yet - for political bonus points. The telecom lobby must be spending rich these days, and like I said, corruption is fully bipartisan. Sure, the D's and the R's slightly favor different money sources...but there's a crap ton of overlap there and little difference when it comes to big biz vs mom and pop. $Big has won 100% of what it wants since I started watching close, in around '64. No matter who held the reins...or reigned, depending on how you like to say that.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[gweihir]

I should add that from an European perspective, both Republicans and Democrats are conservatives...

The problem is, however, not being conservative, the problem is not taking responsibility for your actions and mistakes. Decent people have gotten really rare. The few remaining ones you find all over the place.

Re:Any actual evidence this time?

[DCFusor]

Couldn't agree more. During my time on earth, it's gone from "don't do wrong, because it's wrong" to "don't do wrong, you might get caught". Give up the inner belief in right and wrong...you're toast.
Heck, in a better world, for awhile, it was "do right, increase happiness - what goes around comes around".
And yeah, accountability...largely missing. On this side of the pond, one side more loudly blames others for "everything", but almost no one is actually taking responsibility. And that's kinda the key. Those two things are what the decline are really based on.

Do as I say, not as I did

[hackingbear]

The US itself built its industry by stealing from others, massively. Without that, the US today would be just another Mexico.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you hackingbear the Chinese troll. Are you paid or do you really believe your own bullshit?

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[mangastudent]

Are US or the PRC still developing nations? Are we unreasonable to expect developed nation behavior from a country that by nearly all measures is developed?

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct. We did not obey copyright and stole ideas from Britain. But hey to the other posters, facts what are those. I guess it does not fit in your viewpoint.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

First thing you are going to learn is that US citizens do NOT like hearing the truth, it interferes with their grossly over inflated sense of self worth .

Its like they all you the USA is the greatest country on earth, but when you actually look at HOW, you find they don't rank well at all, and there are lot of other countries which do far better.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

>Are US or the PRC still developing nations?

Yes, and both have barbarians inside the gates in their tribal regions.

>Are we unreasonable to expect developed nation behavior from a country that by nearly all measures is developed?

When we talk about developed nations, bring that up.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[MattBear]

Well... Seems to me the primary difference here is that we stole from the British Empire (a super power, which arguably stole it's tech anyway), when we we're recently liberated British colony (2nd world country equivalent). As opposed to being a super power conducting state sponsered corporate espionage against another super power.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[hackingbear]

PRC looks like still a developing country based on GDP per capita.

Not sure about the US. :-)

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

So ... Do you get paid a salary, or per post? Or just part of your prison sentence?

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[mangastudent]

You make some very good points, but I'll reply that it's not a binary thing ... and ask you, what nations are developed by your criteria? Poland, maybe?

Not even Switzerland satisfies the first criteria; all told, your point is pointless in the context of the discussion.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[mangastudent]

I tend to prefer GDP by PPP, but that doesn't change things much.

Still, how "developing" can you be if you're running and building multiple fab lines, at least some of them fairly close to state of the art? This Wikipedia list is of limited utility because evidently a lot isn't known about many plants, but note that India has exactly 1, run by the government's Indian Space Research Organisation (which is more than a little competent at their official purpose, even evading the Mars curse), and it's doing an 180 nm process on 200 mm wafers. Although Russia is about as bad, but I think that's more a command economy transitioning to a mafia economy thing.

I only skimmed the list after sorting by location, but I think it supports my case.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[KonoWatakushi]

Except that you can't steal ideas, and trying to monopolize them is backward, and not at all in the interest of humanity. We should all encourage the proliferation of good ideas; not only can we all share their benefit at no cost, but then the entire world can freely cooperate to improve the state of the art.

The problem isn't that the US "stole" ideas from Britain, but that they didn't discard the regressive concept of "Intellectual Property" after disrespecting it. In reality, new ideas don't spring forth from a vacuum, they are built upon a mountain of collective experience, and are as much a product of circumstance as ingenuity. Allowing a monopoly on any one can further impede progress by introducing artificial bottlenecks. Everything is a Remix illustrates the concept nicely.

To be fair, this specifically is about trade secrets, but corporate secrets don't stay that way, and it is hard to argue that US monopolists haven't already seen a fair benefit from anything China has "stolen". I'm more concerned about the snowballing monopolies in the US which certainly don't benefit the majority of citizens.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

So, in the late 1700s, when the very concept of copyright was only a century or so old, and there was little to no cultural practice *anywhere* for preserving them... Americans, like most of the world, often broke copyright - usually including their own, not just foreign.

And that justifies China, a country with strong domestic copyright laws that vigorously enforces its own IP both domestically and overseas, that has signed many IP protection agreements with other nations, from running government programs specifically designed to support corporate espionage and IP theft?

Neither the circumstances not the behaviors are at all the same. And THOSE are the facts you are so determined to ignore.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[loonycyborg]

In reality it's about enforcement of national role distribution. That's how UK built the world as a world power. They wanted for Anglo-Saxons(that includes US) to be idea creators, organizers and researchers while other nationalities should be workers who do what they're told. Since most of world's population is located in China and India such role distribution isn't actually sustainable, but it can be forced via scams and military means for two or three centuries tops. You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time. Romans and Mongols have fallen, and just like that Brits will fall too.

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

I only skimmed the list after sorting by location, but I think it supports my case.

Maybe China feel it's still "developing" and more entitled, since the Group of Seven (G7) don't want the Chinese to join?
I think you're better off supporting your case to the G7 countries?

Re: Do as I say, not as I did

[Anonymous Coward]

Oops, it seems you replied to the wrong post...

Re:Do as I say, not as I did

[hackingbear]

1. having a fab line or two does not imply advanced economy. they are just like factories;
2. requiring developing countries to not develop its tech industry and have to stuck in low end manufacturing is selfish and unreasonable;
3. you were implying developing countries can steal tech is OK, I'm sure plenty of people don't agree with you;
4. using #3 to justify the early theft acts of the US is hypocritical.
5. the West has signed up to the fact that China has been a developing country, without a clear legally binding agreement for removing that status. so even if that's no longer true, it is the US and its puppet friends' earlier flaws; why should China take the initiative to harm its own people? If the West is civilized, they should start negotiating instead of making up and exaggerate accusations.
6. under the WTO agreement, most economic practices the US accusing China are allowed, given its developing country status. See #5 for remedies.

Re: IT WAS RUSSIA

[Anonymous Coward]

But, but, BUT OBAMAH!!

Buttery males!

Re: IT WAS RUSSIA

[Anonymous Coward]

But, but, BUT OBAMAH!!

Buttery males!

Ahhh, the squeal of a well-trained NPC.

MSM: Here's something bad Trump did, you need to trust us. We're impartial?
Commentor: Trust? Impartial? Really? When Obama did that, you hid it, so no, we can't trust you because you're not impartial. (See Obama pic with Louis Farrakhan...)
NPC: WHATABOUTISM!!!!!

It's getting old.

Imagine..

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine the security needed if you have $8.75 billion in gold. I bet Micron had nowhere near that level of security for their "secrets".

Whatever you say, Ivan

[Anonymous Coward]

Shouldn't you be bouncing up and down on Putin's cock right now? You're not inventing anything plausible here Ivan.

Re:Whatever you say, Ivan

[Anonymous Coward]

Check his comment history. 100% pro china comments and story submissions. It's so awful and transparent he can't even be state-sponsored.

Re:Whatever you say, Ivan

[Anonymous Coward]

Check your comment history. 100% anti china comments and story submissions 100% pro Tesla/Spacex/Musk. It's so awful and transparent you must be sucking Musk's tiny penis.

WindBourne plz, you're fooling nobody posting AC

Re: Whatever you say, Ivan

[Anonymous Coward]

That may be, but he is right nonetheless.

Ivan is pretending to be Russian for free vodka?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey Republicans, check out your "russian hacker ally" lol? Did you vet this faggot before you made him your Trump campaign cumrag?

Re: IT WAS RUSSIA

[Anonymous Coward]

ORANGE FAN MAD!

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[DCFusor]

Ah yes, demonstrating once again that the left/progressives are "the religion of peace". Troll.

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahhh yes, once again proving that repubtards apply labels to people with no fucking clue.

You are a blind partisan cuck. Fuck off.

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[DCFusor]

Didn't you just do what you accused me of? Why not try shooting me in the face instead? At least I use a real ID, you could even find out who I am and try it, instead of whining. Of course, the attempt might not work out for you.

What did the US expect?

[AHuxley]

When it opened tech production line in Communist China in the 1980's-1990's?
That it was all going to be union free low cost Communist labor for decades making low tax computer parts?
The USA could have kept its tech production lines secret in low tax Ireland, secure in low tax parts of the USA, even opened up in Northern Ireland with a huge UK tax "considerations" just for creating local jobs.

The US gov allowed its tech brands to set up in China and now finds the Communist took the best US tech?

Don't build your tech factories in Communist nations and your tech will stay secure.
Lots of normal nations wanted US tech jobs and would have totally respected and supported all USA security just to get their work force new US tech production line factory work.

What did generations of US govs allow? Allow US brands to give away US secrets to Communist China with every new generation of tech investment.
Was the US brands ingratiation with a Communist party worth it now all the US secrets are lost?
Was a few MI6 and CIA "business" spy fronts deep in China worth the total loss of generations of US tech secrets to China?

Re:What did the US expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep, they sold out the tech to get a small amount of intel. Its idiocy at the highest levels. China needs to be frozen out until it joins the international community as a whole. While it is protectionist and only advances its own interests it should be isolated and denied global partnership.

Re:What did the US expect?

[AHuxley]

That US gov and mil did not understand Communist party support for North Korea, Vietnam?
The US went from war to investing in a nation with full Communist politics that did everything it could against the USA for decades.
That opening US computer production lines in a Communist nation would be secure at any price?
All that investment did was give US tech to Communist China for free.
Then invite US educators to give away US education to the world for free.

Re:What did the US expect?

[vix86]

There is still one thing those "normal nations" were missing and are still missing, that China provided a lot of these electronic hardware manufacturers: little to no operating regulation.

It's starting to change very slowly, but for the longest time, China had incredibly lax environmental regulations. The production of some electronics results in a fair amount of waste that can be pricey to handle in "normal countries." Also, work environment safety is really lax in China as well which helps draw down the price associated with building the products.

This will continue to be the case in a lot of parts of the world in the future to come. Poor regions have no reason to care about health and safety when 80% of the population is poor and possibly starving.

Re:What did the US expect?

[AHuxley]

Parts of South America and non communist Asia would have offered the new US private sector investment the same tax and operating regulations.
To get the jobs. A 1970-1980's export location with electrical power, no tax and no regulations, new ports and roads.
English speaking experts. Rule of law.
They would have kept US secrets and offered equal low wages. No unions and no communist spies.

Their mil/governments would have done all they could to offer low wages and understood all NSA/CIA demands for US export security.

Why go for the nation with full Communism and all its support of past wars with the USA?

Re:What did the US expect?

[vix86]

I don't know much about South America's resources very well, but I know another factor in the electronics manufacturing in China was due to a large number of rare earth metal deposits (which generate a large amount of ground water toxins during mining, see the lax environmental regulations again). I know Brazil has some mines, but I can't tell if they knew about those mines in the 80s or not. I found a slide online that shows China's rare earth mining accelerating drastically in the mid-80s. That really helped with the decision to turn China into a manufacturing power house; at least in electronics.

Re: What did the US expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

Replace 'China' with 'tge United States' and you would be even more right.

Re: What did the US expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

What a load of bullshit.

Re:What did the US expect?

[nasch]

"Allowed".... does the federal government have any authority to tell a private US company it's not allowed to hire workers or set up manufacturing in a particular country?

Re:Me Chinese

[Anonymous Coward]

Coke's taste been trademarked rather than its recipe being a trade secret. If it was just a trade secret, reverse engineering it would have been legal.

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[Anonymous Coward]

You Fox News retards really have to work at inventing new ways to rehash the same retarded bullshit, lol. You probably don't know this, being uneducated, but the nazi faggots lost. Sorry, bitches. Bitte, bitte...

When Trump hangs, you'll understand faggot. Go full nazi retard, get hanged in the square. We're bringing it back. Meanwhile I hope you get shot in your lying faggot face, and that's no exaggeration. Fact check : True.

We're going to rape Trump Junior to pieces in prison, and there's nothing you deplorable Fox faggots can do about it.

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[Anonymous Coward]

How the hell does your comment get positive moderation? You are literally replying to what is clearly a troll and then accusing them of being left/progressive. Not only is there absolutely nothing in the troll's comment that relates to ANY left/progressive platform or statement, but IT IS A FUCKING TROLL. Congratulations, you fell for the troll's bait and confirmed your own inherent bias.

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[Anonymous Coward]

Lol, you haven't realized that you are being toyed with by that troll? They don't have a position to defend, they are just here to antagonize everyone. And you just confirmed your own inherent bias against the left.

Slashdot sucks so hard these days. Such a waste of time sifting through trash comments just to find some reasonable people.

More baseless accusations

[Anonymous Coward]

And besides, DRAM is not exactly a tightly controlled industry secret. Everyone knows how to make it. In particular China who has been the world center for microelectronics for years. Accusing China for trying to steal IP that everyone knows how to make is beyond ridiculous.

It's even more hilarious when you consider that IP theft is one of NSA's key missions, or "technology retrieval" as they call it.

US ever going go issuse repatriations to EU?

[Anonymous Coward]

interesting read (from bloomberg of all places)

Piracy and Fraud Propelled the U.S. Industrial Revolution

https://www.bloomberg.com/opin...

What happened to /.?

[Anonymous Coward]

When did we abandon "Information wants to be free"?

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[DCFusor]

Actually, responding to a horribly partisan comment doesn't mean you're the other flavor of partisan...and yes, I know, it's dumb to feed the trolls.
I also know criticism of one's own side is so rare as to make people think you're on the other one. But what if you hate sides generally?
I'm actually anti-partisan, more anti to the harder core ones, which I feel is consistent. It's dumb to reduce every thought to two states - we're not binary. we're human - and to reduce whole collections of thoughts to be on one artificial side or the other. I can believe in being hard on crime, and legalizing drugs at the same time. I can believe in woman's right to choose in almost all cases, and not be a left wing-nut - even be Christian. I can be that and really not care at all what you do with your junk (or how you name how you identify sexually) - as long as you're not forcing it on me. I can believe in climate change, but also believe in fiscal responsibility. No one represents me - which IS the problem - and whether you see me leaning one way or the other depends on the topic, I suppose. I suspect that lack or representation is most people's problem..the vain hope that one or the other partisan side is a little better has to be a disappointment in the end. At least I don't shoot people in the face, or even threaten to - or use bike locks to commit battery. Obviously a glance in the mirror really bent some troll outa shape. I feel sorry for them, that bitterness at what they look like there must really burn. Me, I can smile. I don't even have to feel like shooting someone in the face is an answer to anything.

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[DCFusor]

Obviously this place isn't completely free of a sense of humor. Does that work for you?

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[DCFusor]

Oh, I see, you think Fox isn't partisan. Got it. Excuse me while I clean off my keyboard.

Drop some nukes on them

[Anonymous Coward]

i think that might deter them

Re: Drop some nukes on them

[Anonymous Coward]

They've got nukes too you know ...

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck your feelings, traitor.

Re:It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the face

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh look, a sighting of Schrodinger's Douchebag, in the wild!

Honest business doesn't need trade secrets

[edris90]

If you plan on your information being compromised in the first place then you don't have to bother with security. If your business depends on hiding information, and your business should not receive protection by society. It is not in the interests of the people to allow information hoarding by large business

Re: It's time to shoot Fox News faggots in the fac

[Anonymous Coward]

And this, my friends, is the base of the democratic party in the US. Gee, how do they keep losing elections??

Bollocks

[Anonymous Coward]

They offered a better job to some executives. Well, bad luck Micron, cheaping out on salaries and bonuses.
How I see it, Trump administration is trying to destroy a semiconductor initiative in China using lawfare methods, which is essentially a legalized piracy.

And no they will obey and stop getting competitive in this industry. Competition is needed in DRAM industry, current prices tell us so.

"accused WITH stealing secrets"

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently /. doesn't have even the most basic editorial control.

quit hiring spies

[WindBourne]

Seriously, if a company is high-tech, or it is known that CHina is interested in you, quit hiring ppl that will steal from you. You have the RIGHT to protect your IP.