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?"

Bugged, you say?

[gowen]

My computer's bugged. It keeps regurgitating the same information over and over again [slashdot.org].

Takes one to know one

[Anonymous Coward]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1769 642.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/01 /19/china.plane.bug/index.html [cnn.com]
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/04/15/10501725 99474.html [smh.com.au]

Bugs don't need to be software.

[cduffy]

Maybe they're talking about hardware that, say... logs keystrokes, and can be summoned to retrieve them by a later software infection (or by a low-power radio request -- if these machines make it into an embassy or somesuch, it's entirely reasonable to have a feet-on-the-ground representative carry a piece of hardware that transfers the logs off the box).

Look at some of the ways the US bugged equipment exported to Russia during the cold war -- there's a lot of ingenuity going on there.

US Embassy - Moscow

[Morky]

It reminds me of when the US let the Soviets build their embassy in Moscow. Bugs in the bricks. They couldn't use it.