US Government Fears China Bugs Lenovo PCs

An anonymous reader writes "After approving the sale of IBM's PC Division to the Chinese Corporation Lenovo, the US Government has realized China could bug Lenovo PCs destined for US Government customers. Would the US have done the same to China? With American businesses so eager for business in China no matter what, where are we headed?"

Yes

[Samir Gupta]

The USA did it to China indeed [slashdot.org].

Very sensible move

[Anonymous Coward]

I suppose that the governments in other parts of the world will take notice and similarly ban Windows because of the risks of its being bugged.

Re:You better believe they'd do it ...

[strider44]

I think that bugging everything that is used by a foreign government (even allied governments) is bugged and that's just something that happens, almost as if it's expected. The following is from a friend of a friend of a family member so expect it to be exaggerated or possibly wrong (though I don't think it is), but apparently every piece of military hardware imported from America here to Australia is striped and taken apart and thoroughly checked for tracking devices and bugs, and they're routinely found. This is one of the closest allies in the "War on Terror".

US citizens fears gov bugs internet

[pubjames]

Today, Wired published the full evidence of the AT&T/NSA domestic surveillance program. It is fascinating reading:

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70944-0.htm l [wired.com]

We have a saying...

[Serious Simon]

In the Netherlands we have a saying that can be translated into English as "The way the innkeeper is himself, he suspects his guests"...

NEW WORLD ORDER

[CranberryKing]

This is WHERE we are headed. It's by design.

Believe it.

US bugs Chinese "Airforce 1" Okay?!

[didiken]

Funny that US has bugged a Boeing 767 purchased from the US [bbc.co.uk] for use by former President Jiang Zemin [sptimes.com].

Didn't hear the Chinese stop buying jumbo jets.

Re:So how does this supposed bugging scam work?

[acaspis]

How many amateurs and computer engineers are there around the world picking their computers apart?

Yeah, how many pick the ethernet chip apart, transistor by transistor ?

Plus, note that a backdoor does not necessarily result in observable information flow. If I wanted to bug a PC, I'd patch its hardware random number generator.

AC

Re:Aw, these Americans...

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you seen our trade deficit with China. Personally I think we should halt all shipments of goods from China to the U.S. till they properly value the Yuan.

There will never be democracy in the Middle East, Islam won't allow it. Name one democratic Middle Eastern country. Even Iraq is a sham democracy which the people of Iraq set up with very little interference from us. If we wanted true democracy in Iraq we should have done the same thing there that we did at the end of the second world war in Japan. It's no mystery why the Japanese constitution is the same as ours or that they're one of the world's largest economic powers. The same thing would be harder to do in Iraq, because Islamics would rather hunch down in a burned out hovel or cave and cook goat meat on a cow dung fire while fomenting jihad against the infidels, rather than contribute to society, peace and prosperity for all.

Ask all those folks down at Gitmo if they'd like to go home, where they most definitely would be tortured and killed. Where do those torture flights go? To Middle Eastern countries who have no qualms whatsoever about torturing their own people.

I personally would love nothing more than for the United States to pull in it's horns and spend the trillions of dollars in aid it gives to every other government in the world right here at home. Hell the Indonesian tsunami victims got more help from the U.S. Government and private American donors than our own gulf coast hurricane Katrina victims did. They're open for the tourist season again, while Louisiana still has refrigerators stuck up in the treetops. Were still up in the Pakistani mountains helping earthquake survivors, the very people who have been aiding Bin Laden in avoiding capture for years. I don't think we should be propping up either the Palestinian or Israeli governments. Every time Iran has a major earthquake which turns their mud huts to piles of rubble were there with a helping hand. They've got a lot of oil money and rather than help their own people build safe earthquake proof structures they build atomic nuclear reactors on major earthquake fault lines. We should quit being spit on and start spitting back, by removing all aid to everyone and let the entire world go to hell in a hand basket. Without the kindness and generosity of our people the world's entire global economy would screech to a halt. All we've really asked is for you to be civil, fair and quit spitting on us. Guess that was to much to ask for.

Not real sure where your from, however you sound like a European. The very same people who pillaged, robbed, raped, tortured and subjugated the entire world, because of your greed, lust for power etc. If you gave South America, India, Asia, America etc. back half the riches you stole from them we would all be better off. Next you'll holler about the American Indian, yet you forget we bought the land from you or defeated you in battle over it, after you pillaged, robbed, raped, tortured and subjugated them. Indians didn't invent scalping, the French, English and Spanish did.

Let's just hope total war is obsolete

[Enrique1218]

I really don't how a services economy is going to mobilize for the next big war. How many financial analysts does it take to build F22? How many systems administrator does it take to build a submarine? I am going to mention the lower class who are alcoholic, drug-addicted, or just plain disillioned as their jobs are ship over seas or given to illegal immigrants. I am sure we can round up all the prostitutes, strippers, and drug addicts and train them to build a tank. Computer components are vital part our warfighting ability and exactly how much of that is manufacture in the continental US? I guess we are assuming that in a war with China, we can always have them make our weapons for us so we can in turn drop on them. Seems logical and we don't have top pay for shipping. Spying is the least of our problems. China hasn't asserted itself so far because it still needs to grow some but what about 20 years from now? We can always hope China evolves into a pluralistic democracy but then again we are one and we still invaded Iraq.