If China was doing this with boots on the ground - with people physically acquiring this information on-site - it would be a major international incident. I don't quite grasp why doing the same thing over the Internet is significantly different.
They do plenty of that too, both at research institutions and corporations. If you look for news articles, you’ll find them, but it isn’t something that is generally noticed as a story. It’s been rampant for decades though.
What makes you think they don't do that? Of course they do that. They even send chinese women to seduce lonely pathetic FBI/CIA/etc officials to get information. There was a huge story about it a few years ago.
But everyone does it. The brits, french, russians, koreans, japanese, germans, saudis, etc all do it. Hell the nation with the largest spy network in the US is our ally Israel.
The chinese are amateurs when it comes to spying on the internet or in the real world. Once they get to israel's level, then you the media won't even report on their spying and if they do, they'll make excuses for it.
Imagine there is one billion people- and they are deemed by their own government so incapable of innovating tech - and so not in need of future IP protection due to a lack of inventions, that such massive industrial espionage is deemed a better trade off.
For a Chinese developer- this is actually the hardest insult somebody could throw at them.
This is perfectly normal. As in, every country considers offensive hacking an espionage operation,not different from hiring moles at those companies to collect intel.
It isn't one way either,every developed country has multiple apt groups. What China does against american companies,america does against british companies,etc...
[+] [-] forapurpose|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lawnchair_larry|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] prmths|8 years ago|reply
But everyone does it. The brits, french, russians, koreans, japanese, germans, saudis, etc all do it. Hell the nation with the largest spy network in the US is our ally Israel.
The chinese are amateurs when it comes to spying on the internet or in the real world. Once they get to israel's level, then you the media won't even report on their spying and if they do, they'll make excuses for it.
[+] [-] olliej|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zarkov99|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bitcharmer|8 years ago|reply
Apart from (quite obviously) USA there is a handful of other powerful actors (ie. Israel, UK) in the game but you rarely get to read about it.
It just makes me trust "western" news outlets less.
[+] [-] ggm|8 years ago|reply
They might be the biggest by economic scale and consequence. They might be the most visible.
But this is not unique.
[+] [-] rdlecler1|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Pica_soO|8 years ago|reply
For a Chinese developer- this is actually the hardest insult somebody could throw at them.
[+] [-] zarkov99|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] badrabbit|8 years ago|reply
It isn't one way either,every developed country has multiple apt groups. What China does against american companies,america does against british companies,etc...
[+] [-] forapurpose|8 years ago|reply