back to article Schmidt slams China as world's most prolific hacker

Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt has strongly criticised China, claiming the country is the world’s most prolific hacker of foreign firms and predicting that its actions will increasingly drive Western tech vendors closer to their governments. The remarks came in a new book, The New Digital Age, which the Wall Street …

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  1. Lars Silver badge
    Coat

    No doubt

    He is right, but.

    1. No, I will not fix your computer

      Re: No doubt

      China has around 5x as many people as the US, so it's not surprising there's a lot of hacking/malware etc.

      Per capita they are not as bad as the US (where most botnets run from), in other words there's a higher percentage of nefarious traffic from the US than from China.

      You can play with stats as much as you like (for example only select technically savvy people) - and of course the blocking of information great firewall etc. it's perhaps surprising that there's some much technical awareness in China, but at the end of the day, the US is hardly whiter than white!

  2. DF118

    America's sense of fair play

    Hmmmm....

    1. Magani
      WTF?

      Re: America's sense of fair play

      "...and because illicit competition violates the American sense of fair play,”

      Just ask any country that has a 'Free Trade Agreement' with the US about their sense of fair play.

  3. Ole Juul

    Educated and well travelled

    But his mind and soul stay at home.

  4. Khaptain Silver badge
    Happy

    Ex title holders ?

    Does this mean that the Mericans have been knocked of the top spot?

  5. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    He who pays the piper, calls the tune ......

    “The United States will not take the same path of digital corporate espionage, as its laws are much stricter (and better enforced) and because illicit competition violates the American sense of fair play,” the book states, according to the WSJ.

    Most interestingly, the book apparently claims that Western tech firms may increasingly find themselves aligned with their governments in opposition to China and work to co-ordinate efforts “on both diplomatic and technical levels”.

    Others, however, may expect and be enabled to realise via virtualisation, the opposite of all of that to be true and be much more likely to lead to closer Wild Wacky Westerner cooperation with the East.:-) Certainly if the latter half of http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2013/02/03/wikileaks_feds_iceland/#c_1716297 be true, would it be a foolish folly to imagine anything different, for surely only a mentally deficient, intellectually challenged idiot would wish to support a failed warring state of tyranny and anarchy.

    Who do you think is pulling Eric Schmidt's strings and provide his lines and scripts and scrip?

    1. Khaptain Silver badge

      Re: He who pays the piper, calls the tune ......

      I think it would be safe to assume that Eric Schmidt must be no1 provider for the NSA/CIA/FBI today.

      As well as being extremely efficient in Search Engine technology I can easily imagine that their are some very clever Oompa Loompas in Google's labs capable of doing a lot more that simply returning search results.....

    2. Armando 123

      Re: He who pays the piper, calls the tune ......

      "Who do you think is pulling Eric Schmidt's strings and provide his lines and scripts and scrip?"

      People as wealthy as Schmidt pull the government's strings, not vice versa. Although the way the government keeps gaining power and stripping rights, you may be right.

  6. ratfox
    Trollface

    "illicit competition violates the American sense of fair play"

    Ha ha ha ha ha… Oh wait, you're serious. Let me laugh even harder:

    WAAA HAA HA HA HA HA HA… /Bender

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Mushroom

      Re: "illicit competition violates the American sense of fair play"

      I pee'd myself a little.....

      How are those import restrictions going then?

      Citrus fruit from Argentina, steel from India and Italy, Car parts from China and on and on...

      How's the WTO case about external hosted gambling sites going guys?

      Yup many of the other parties involved are also guilty of there own trade fixing, but don't pretend that you play fair and don't pretend that the US are involved in Industrial espionage and dirty tricks.

      So stop locking people up without trial, torturing people and pretending it's not actually proper torture, lift all your trade restrictions, stop using spies (including spy satellites), blowing people up in other countries that have FA to do with "war on terror" and then, and only then, claim the holier than thou crown, but until then STFU.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Meh

    Yes, but ...

    I find myself worrying more about proofing my kit against Google nosiness than Chinese hacking. While I imagine businesses may feel the opposite, they should worry just as much about the information gathered by Google.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Somehow ..

    .. this bleating of Schmidt sounds hollow.

    First of all, I don't trust the guy as far as I can throw him. Google is the most insidious data gatherer on the planet right now, and Schmidt made his opinion about the rights we have to our privacy very clear (i.e. none - yet try finding out anything about Schmidt).

    Secondly, the events surrounding the China affair made only one thing clear: in the Google data centres, there is a jack marked "NSA". As for the Chinese "hacking" thing, I note with interest that (a) this happened at a time when Google had to admit defeat in China, and so conveniently could use the "breach" as an excuse to pull out rather than the real cause, and (b) the physical terrorist threat has decreased, so the US needs another enemy du jour, and it tends to round on those who are their best competitors. This will certainly be in the news for a couple of weeks/months, as the whole terrorist game is being moved to Africa (logistics always take time).

    Oh, and The United States will not take the same path of digital corporate espionage ?!?!

    I agree with another commentard here: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA.

    1. Slawek

      Re: Somehow ..

      Yes, "The United States will not take the same path of digital corporate espionage "

      US government does not have a large organization devoted to hacking foreign companies to get their secrets. The anti-hacking laws are also quite strict, so I do not think any, even medium size company, would do it either.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Somehow ..

        US government does not have a large organization devoted to hacking foreign companies to get their secrets

        I think you didn't quite get what they meant when they said they have No Such Agency. And there is a little club that manages toys such as ECHELON.

        As for anti-hacking laws, note that they tend to apply to 3rd parties hacking the government, NOT vice versa. The US have even done away with the requirement that there is no spying on their own population.

        1. Slawek

          Re: Somehow ..

          You did not quite get what I wrote. I said "US government does not have a large organization devoted to hacking foreign companies to get their secrets"

          Do you believe that the role of NSA is "hacking foreign companies to get their secrets"?

          1. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

            Is it though one of the major critical role of intelligence in global intelligence agencies today?

            Do you believe that the role of NSA is "hacking foreign companies to get their secrets"?..... Slawek Posted Tuesday 5th February 2013 05:34 GMT

            To believe that the NSA does not both actively support and not hinder home team players in such roles is probably almost impossible for El Regers to believe, Slawek.

            Surely you do not really believe it yourself, do you? Or are we to believe that the likes of multinationals like a Google or a Microsoft or an Apple or a Boeing or a Lockheed Martin's Advanced Development Programs (ADP) Skunkworks have the more necessary brainpower and easier opportunity to deliver to foreigners their goods?

            Quite whether though, if they do it themselves inhouse or through their tacit and covert clandestine support of it via the actions of others outsourcing such abilities/facilities in the shadow intelligence sectors for a renegade plausible deniability, they be any good at it and it has any great effect on anything which is important in the grander scheme of things, is an altogether different matter, methinks, for the field does not suffer from and thus neither tolerates fools who are but useful and useless tools in its and ITs midsts.

            And the short answers to your question are .... Of course it is one of their major roles .... with the shortest possible response being a resounding ..... Yes/да/Oui/Ja/是/はい/نعم

  9. Jolyon Ralph

    Mmm yes..

    From his Daughter's blog (https://sites.google.com/site/sophieinnorthkorea/home) describing their trip to North Korea.

    " We left our phones and laptops behind in China, since we were warned they'd be confiscated in NK, and probably infected with lord knows what malware."

    Mmm yes, leave your laptops in China. Good advice there :)

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Expect google to be hacked next...

    if we hear about it that is.

    1. fatchap
      WTF?

      Re: Expect google to be hacked next...

      Like Operation Aurora you mean? BIYF

  11. ssfk
    Linux

    make up your mind!

    More sour grapes....

    But I rejoice that Eric Schmidt is complaining... it can mean only 1 thing. the American government is not able to hack into Chinese Government defence and has instead resorted to political bullying as always especially .

    And it reaffirms to me once again if America is not the first then any other country is worthless.

    I am glad Chinese people is standing up for themselves.

    Everyone in the far east knows its an open secret that the American government has been hacking the chinese for eons policing the World.......... justice keeper, right...........

    Btw, American cannot take advantage of the chinese market. If the Americans hate the chinese so much perhaps they should withdraw Maconalds out of the country........

    Please americans... one lie too many. People around the world is not stupid.. Amercians are only doing this because China is doing better than the Americans. Americans get green eye monster so easily.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Echelon anybody?

    Yeah right. Because it's not like the US has been using ECHELON ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON ) since the 60's or Project Carnivore or Styxnet or a large number of all kinds of other spy/hacking projects.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    In Other News

    Mr. Adolf H. calls Mr. Schmidt 'a bit too right winged to my taste'.

    1. Slawek

      Re: In Other News

      Of course. Adolf Hitler was a National Socialist.

  14. John Savard

    Driven

    I found it amusing that he considered it a bad consequence of Chinese hacking that tech companies would be "driven closer to their governments" in the Western democracies. It's not clear to me why it's a bad thing for businesses to think about the national interest and not just making money - because, in a democracy, the government does represent the genuine national interest. Or is he dreaming of some Libertarian utopia as the desirable human future?

  15. Armando 123
    Holmes

    Stop press shocker

    "the country is the world’s most prolific hacker of foreign firms"

    The heck you say.

  16. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    Hot Wireless Dogging. Take Care Out There, Some who may be Many are More than Just Extremely Aware

    There is an abiding systemic problem in all search engined businesses/spooky snoopy services and that is that they are easily groomed to believe a certain common analytical profile based upon virtual internet use and data acquisition ... cyber cruising.

    When one realises and accepts, and whether it be true or just pimped by the status quo to be true in order to discourage independent irregular and unconventional thought and novel disruptive action, that the system employs peeping tom analysts to monitor all manner of communications, is the smarter investor and more savvy entrepreneur always going to leave a trail which analysts will advise interested second and third parties indicates a certain likely future course of proaction even though it be a false flag event trail which is specifically designed to search for and/or test and/or attack the cyber defences and virtual abilities of google eyed listeners whilst leading the spooky snoopy servers to believe in a phantom being about which they would actually know precious little that is real with nothing able and enabled to be used as leverage against the target.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Hot Wireless Dogging.

      I think that last paragraph will remain impossible to parse, even with adding a large helping of commas and full stops..

      1. Qu Dawei

        Re: Hot Wireless Dogging.

        Don't worry: I think it was a beta-test of the next generation software for Google Translate.

  17. MacGyver
    IT Angle

    Look at your firewall logs.

    I get port scanned by China (all provinces) continuously and it has been that way for over 8 years (since I have been watching). I couldn't tell you whether or not it is government directed but there is definitely is a "Chinese Hacker Problem". To be fair I also see lots of other European countries in my firewall logs, but China is the origin of 99% of the scans.

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