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The Messy Truth About Infiltrating Computer Supply Chains (theintercept.com)
In October last year, Bloomberg Businessweek published an alarming story: Operatives working for China's People's Liberation Army had secretly implanted microchips into motherboards made in China and sold by U.S.-based Supermicro.
While Bloomberg's story -- which has been challenged by numerous players -- may well be completely (or partly) wrong, the danger of China compromising hardware supply chains is very real, judging from classified intelligence documents, reports The Intercept.
From the report: U.S. spy agencies were warned about the threat in stark terms nearly a decade ago and even assessed that China was adept at corrupting the software bundled closest to a computer's hardware at the factory, threatening some of the U.S. government's most sensitive machines, according to documents provided by National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden. The documents also detail how the U.S. and its allies have themselves systematically targeted and subverted tech supply chains, with the NSA conducting its own such operations, including in China, in partnership with the CIA and other intelligence agencies. The documents also disclose supply chain operations by German and French intelligence.
What's clear is that supply chain attacks are a well-established, if underappreciated, method of surveillance -- and much work remains to be done to secure computing devices from this type of compromise. "An increasing number of actors are seeking the capability to target ... supply chains and other components of the U.S. information infrastructure," the intelligence community stated in a secret 2009 report. "Intelligence reporting provides only limited information on efforts to compromise supply chains, in large part because we do not have the access or technology in place necessary for reliable detection of such operations."
What's clear is that supply chain attacks are a well-established, if underappreciated, method of surveillance -- and much work remains to be done to secure computing devices from this type of compromise. "An increasing number of actors are seeking the capability to target ... supply chains and other components of the U.S. information infrastructure," the intelligence community stated in a secret 2009 report. "Intelligence reporting provides only limited information on efforts to compromise supply chains, in large part because we do not have the access or technology in place necessary for reliable detection of such operations."
Think about it: if every computer on the planet is streaming private material to China, what the hell would China do with all that data? And why would I care? its not like the Chinese are going to send me for re-education. OTOH, we can see what happens when the NSA comes after you.
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How does it "generate hate" to point out that China attacks the US constantly online and seeks to overthrow our superpower status technologically through subterfuge because they have a less capable military currently?
Maybe you just don't understand hegemony? It's always going to be there until we have either world governance (UN is toothless by design..) or one power cements itself as the only power.
Pretending China is an equal-opposite analogue of the US is where these analogies fail. They are not a country of actual laws. They are actually a cabal.
Yes, the US is served by defending itself from China, and vice versa. To jump to an omni-beneficial relationship would require serious restructuring that won't happen without bloodshed in either case.
So, detente instead. Pretending it's unwarranted or immoral is to not understand the point of it.