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We know that there is something drastically wrong with the state of US paranoia in recent years, driven as it is by the Shrub administration, their right-wing scare-mongering media and their belief that ‘The World Changed After 9/11‘, but one of today’s stories should get a prize for its stupidity.
Earlier this year, the US State Department ordered 16,000 new PC’s from Lenovo. For those that don’t know, Lenovo is a Chinese PC manufacturer who used to make Thinkpad’s and other kit for IBM. When IBM decided to sell off it’s PC manufacturing and get out of the business, it was Lenovo who bought them out and now make the same kit under it’s own brand name.
The PC’s have been delivered and many connected up to State Department networks to do their job. Until Republican Congressman Frank Wolf stepped in with ‘fears the kit could be used by China to spy on the US’. This paranoid maniac and his chums have convinced the State Department that Lenovo may have secreted some ‘back-door’ piece of hardware/softare into the machines so that they can collect classified data. And the State Department has agreed and yanked all Lenovo kit from classified networks, assigning them to other tasks. No doubt Solitaire and downloading porn, sorry, I meant religious tracts.
Now, here’s the bit that really wins the prize for this stupidity. When they used to buy the kit from IBM, it was made in China and no one worried. The 16,000 they have just had delivered from the same Chinese company - were made in old IBM plants in North Carolina, USA.
Don’t you just love them!
ofcourse I love them… Where else would I get my daily dumb moment from!!
I must say, The American Government always tends to figure out a new way to amaze me. With People that smart running the government of the strongest power in the world, no doubt that world piece can be achieved!
The funny part of this whole fiasco is the fact that OTHER pc’s and laptops are made in China too. I wonder if the Chinese have *bugged* them too! Heck, even Dell has a plant in China. Let’s throw all the pc’s and laptops away and go back to doing stuff old-school style!
Did you notice the other bit of legislation they passed yesterday in the Senate? English as their national language… presumably because the forecast says that by the end of this decade there will be more Spanish speakers than English speakers living in the States.
It is not unreasonable to think that Chinese companies (even those out of HK like Lenovo) will do Beijing’s bidding. However, wouldn’t it be really easy to discovery anything in the computers that allows tracking back? Or is the fear not so much that there’s a software bug, but rather that there is a listening bug? If I knew more about the technical side I would be much better able to determine whether this is politically motivated or not. It certainly does seem to be.
@ China Law Blog: I think the American’s feel that they are not smart enough to figure out the Chinese tech wizards :-D.
It’s funny though, since most all computer parts are made in China and in this case the OS’s would be removed as well and re-installed, so the threat really *does* seem a little exaggerated.
@ Andy: Yes, have been following that peice for a while. America is trying to copy France I guess :-D. Then again, the threat is *very* real. I’m glad I knew spanish while in Texas, used to speak spanish more than english most of the time.
It will help me when I visit I guess. My capacity to learn languages is on a par to my abilty to perform open heart surgery…
It’s almost a celebration of our stupidity, isn’t it? I mean, we have to yank those comps not because the Chinese may have secreted some sort of inscrutable spyware in them, but because we lack the know-how to either detect or remove/disable anything they may have stashed in them.
Plus, we have to let everyone know just how dumb we are.
I think the final straw will be when we win the World Cup. That will be the one thing that just pushes the rest of the world over the edge.
What no comment on how they should all use Macs?
Are they made in the good old USA?
Macs? All China I believe.
But hey - if the US government in Washingtom used Macs they wouldn’t be worried about the Chinese; they’d be more paranoid about those liberal pinko Californians spying on them…
kodos423
Win the World Cup! Now there’s a thought….