Industrial Espionage with Nation-State ties is nothing new - and the Chinese aren't even the best at it. What the Chinese had was the most "headroom"
to grow into the stuff they were stealing. (Back to this shortly.)
What bothers me about the China-China-China cry in Cyber, telecom, IT, etc. is that it's totally counterproductive to fixing the problem. The China
cries get louder and it leads people to believe they need Government to step in an "fix" the problem - except Government has little chance of solving
any of the associated problems. Being industrial espionage or State-Sponsored spying. Every time DC puts out another China story there are C-levels
all over that step back from doing ~anything~ to wait for Government. Waiting for Government is a losing proposition.
And underlying the whole mess is that when the Russians, French, Japanese, Israelis, etc. were (are) doing the same thing we fought back a better way
- COMPETE. With China this pervasive growing lethargy and self-loathing has turned into a bizarre additional form of b*tching and protectionism.
A term that was coined in the recent past was "IP Obesity" - as in Intellectual Property Obesity - this belief that Copyright and Patent portfolios
would somehow protect your future development. That may have worked in the legacy world where agility wasn't an issue and asymmetric business might
(read: Lawyers) was achievable. That's jut not the case today.
It's just a bloody mess..
Ironically about every second-tier Nation-State is really anxious to get in on the Chinese model of IP theft. And China now is in the position where
they are the easy pickings/target so they are increasingly interesting in pursuing WTO type International pressure and bilateral agreements along w/
their financing.
The lesser irony is that China knew they couldn't compete with the West's State apparatus for technical espionage and surveillance (and still can't
today) so they went for economic development instead. All the while the "secrets" the West were going for were becoming less and less valuable. China
chose the right side of the equation - like a younger US did once.
*sigh* I wish the US was pushing for more competitive innovation and business practice domestically. I try to find US made products, by US owned
companies, that don't use union labor - and it's bloody well difficult if not impossible for most products. -Mags
edit on 9-10-2012 by
Insurrection because: Minor word change..
edit on 9-10-2012 by Insurrection because: Gah. Horrible wording throughout.. more minor
changes.