Lenovo Under U.S. Probe for Spying

BigControversy writes "The DailyTech has a report indicating that Lenovo, the giant Chinese PC manufacturer, is under a probe by the U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission (USCC) for possible bugging. Apparently, the government has ordered 16,000 PCs from Lenovo but is now requesting that Lenovo be investigated by intelligence agencies. The fear is of foreign intelligence applying pressure to Lenovo to equip its PCs so that the U.S. can be spied on." From the article: "Despite the probe, Lenovo says that its international business, especially those that deal with the US, follow strictly laid out government regulations and rules. Lenovo also claims that even after purchasing IBM's PC division, its international business has not been affected negatively. Interestingly, in an interview with the BBC, Lenovo mentioned that an open investigation or probe may negatively affect the way that the company deals with future government contracts or bids." There just has to be better uses of our intelligence community's time.

Supposition and Speculation

[Billosaur]

The supposed problem presented by the USCC is that the 16,000 computers are being built by a Chinese-mainland company. The USCC argues that a foreign intelligence like that of the Communist Party of China (CPC) can use its power to get Lenovo to equip its machines with espionage devices. Lenovo has strongly declined that it is involved in any such activities.

On the one hand, they have a point: it would be very easy for the Chinese government to "encourage" Lenovo to plant things in these machines to allow them to spy on the US. On the other hand, given the profusion of malware, keyloggers, Trojans, and such, the Chinese government could already be spying on the US without having to go to such extraordinary lengths. Frankly, it's too obvious to be credible.

TV, and DVD Players May Listen Too!

[blueZhift]

Hmmm, with so many goods coming from China these days, your TV and DVD player may be spying on you too, or in the near future, especially with the growth of home networks. Seriously, trying to buy any kind of electronics that don't come from China is getting harder and harder. Do it yourselfers aren't much safer, afterall, would anyone notice if the network chip on that Chinese made motherboard have some extra functionality? My, isn't paranoia fun?

If you need real security

[Rhys]

And you didn't install the OS yourself from something "known good" (or at least believed good, like a generic windows install CD bought at best buy or your other favorite local rip-off shop) you're an idiot.

Beyond that, by talking about it, you've given "the enemy" information on how your IT practices work: you pretty obviously don't use ghost or any similar sort of mass deployment software. (yes, I realize that for laptops with all their custom crap it doesn't work as well. Still, a place I worked as a summer intern used to do it back in the 96-2000 era on IBM thinkpads, so...)

Security by obscurity? Sure. That is all your password is, after all too, it (sec by obs) isn't strictly a bad thing.

Re:So let me get this straight..

[TheBogie]

It's not that the parts come from China, it's that now the responsibility for keeping spyware type stuff off of the computer is China's. If they bought their computers from a domestic supplier, there would be at least one other entity checking these computers. Since the entire box now comes from China, it is necessary for the intelligence community to do the checking. This makes a lot of sense to me.

Re:Disagree on the last comment

[WindBourne]

In light of all the spying that we did against the USSR (xerox copy machines, sabatoged oil line controls leading to an explosion, etc) and China (using Nauru's embassy, splices in the telecom, etc.) , we would be insane to not check the equipment. What amazes me is that over the last 5 years, our gov. has outsourced so many critical areas to nations that are at best neutral, and more likely future enemies.

Re:If you need real security

[chill]

And you didn't install the OS yourself from something "known good" (or at least believed good, like a generic windows install CD bought at best buy or your other favorite local rip-off shop) you're an idiot.

Irrelevant.

BIOS has gotten to the point [phoenix.com] that it can "phone home" before you even get to the OS. A small modification to hardware or firmware can make it so the system inserts key packets into the network stream, sending covert messages out to the equivalent of electronic "dead drops".

We aren't talking about always-on-a-secure-network PCs, but laptops that'll be jacked into hotels, Starbucks and other insecure networks at some point.

Unless you jack those machines in behind a traffic analyzer/router that captures every packet, then analyze *each* packet that goes out of the machine, you'll never be 100% sure the hardware isn't trojaned.

Ping is nice and innocuous. Are you sure you know what that 56-byte payload contains [wfu.edu]? Have you ever looked? What about DNS requests? They happen ALL the time. Did you analyze each one to make sure they aren't requesting TXT-records that get forwarded over to a Chinese-owned server in the U.S.?

  -Charles

This is a good argument for open source hardware.

[Anonymous Coward]

Like it or not, we totally depend on other countries. I used to work on a military system that used tubes (valves for you brits). The tubes were no longer made in the west. The only source of the tubes was the USSR (with whom we would have been at war, if there was a war). If the third world war had lasted more than a month, we would have had to order spare parts from the Russians.

Mil Spec used to require second source suppliers for everything. That means every chip, resistor and capacitor. To do that now would require that several companies have the complete design of everything down to the last square mm of silicon. Such a policy would effectively prevent spying devices because many people would be able to examine the design. The same reason that open source is safer than Windows is the same reason that hardware designs should be open sourced (or at least second sourced).

BTW. You are absolutely right. Even friendly countries spy on each other. There was a story going around a while ago about an embassy had to be totally torn down because the local workers who built it had planted many microphones in it.

Declining population

[hackwrench]

China:1,306,313,813
United States: 298,290,000
Get back to me when China doesn't outnumber the United States 4 to 1.

But seriously, what effect does declining population have on either China's stability or beligerence.

Also, what does it say when successive generations are viewed not as hope for the future but a threat to it?

Only on slashdot...

[pmike_bauer]

...are you going to find a collection of article summaries that:

1) criticize the United States for using it's intelligence resources to protect itself from a corporation operating out of Communist China.

2) criticize the US for not using intelligence resources "_enough_" to protect its ports/borders/etc.

3) criticize the US for using intelligence resource "_too_much_" by wire-tapping potential terrorists.

Go figure.

We have enteredd the xenophobic stage

[Serveert]

Anti immigrant, anti foreigners(Lenovo, CNOOC 18.b billion USD bid for US oil company, Dubai ports deal, Israeli attempt to by US security firm,etc etc). We're like this precisely when reports come out saying there is little savings by Americans. Foreigners are flush with cash, they are sitting on piles and piles of dollars, and they're finding dollars are harder to use.

I still maintain that as this continues this will increase inflation, USD will be the new monopoly money.

Re:Disagree on the last comment

[wfberg]

What amazes me is that over the last 5 years, our gov. has outsourced so many critical areas to nations that are at best neutral, and more likely future enemies.

A cynic might take that to mean that the US is looking to make a lot more enemies.. Who am I kidding, the plans to invade my country have already been made, a bill was passed by Congress to invade The Hague in the event the International Criminal Court would ever attempt to try a USian.. SO yeah, I live in a future enemy State, despite being one of the strongest supporters of NATO....

Re:Disagree on the last comment

[dslbrian]

The reason for picking on China is xenophobia, plain, old and simple, dressed up in McCarthy era justifications around communism.

Hardly. The fact is that China is really the only adversary who potentially has the military strength and intent to engage the US. North Korea and Taiwan are both problem areas where the Chinese and American viewpoints are very different. I'm sure European and Middle Eastern countries spy as well, but the US is not going to be invaded by Germany or Jordan.

I'm sure China would just love to get a bunch of bugged PCs into places like the LLNL [llnl.gov] or NSA. Having a backdoor into the US labs developing missile defence systems would be their dream come true.

Eventually the Taiwan problem is going to have to be resolved. I can see this happening either by the Chinese government eventually becoming more moderate (ideally becoming democratic, but more likely giving up on the hardline Taiwan stance), or by a military conflict (eventually their economic and military strength will reach a level where they will think they can do whatever they want - its just a matter of time). I imagine the hardliners see the latter as the road to "reunification", so its very much in their interest to spy all they can. Lenovo might just be another part of their effort [slashdot.org].