Author: Gary Eastwood / Source: The Next Web
Recent developments emanating from Beijing have many Westerners concerned; a spate of China-based tech IPOs have even ignited widespread paranoia that companies like Huawei and other Chinese tech firms are spying on American citizens and leveraging their sales to steal intellectual information.
I’ve seen intense paranoia wrack the market before, but it seems like today’s fears are more widespread than ever.Is there any truth to the paranoia that Chinese tech firms are embarking on unprecedented surveillance missions? As we’ll come to see, our paranoia over the rise of another big tech market in Asia is largely misplaced, and could be alleviated with some reasoned discussion.
The accusations are flying left and right
Accusations and bitter barbs are being flung left and right by major business leaders in both the United States and China. I’ve even noticed political leaders getting involved, with the likes of President Trump declaring veritable trade wars on China for what he claims to be an unprecedented historical trade deficit.
What’s surprised me the most is that even many Western consumers are starting to fall into hysteria, given that tech leaders like Richard Yu are going so far as to intone that major Chinese tech firms like Huawei are having a tough time finding US-based business partners. While Huawei will finally start selling its smartphones in the US later this year, it’s safe to say that the economic damage has already been done.
But is there any truth to the widespread rumors that are floating around the market? After all, disinformation is rife, especially in a tech sector where companies from across the world are constantly spying on one another in order to gain a competitive advantage. I’ve heard countless hypocrites intone that Chinese firms are unfairly collecting information on the competition, for instance, but no one ever seems to talk about Western firms doing the same thing.
I recall reading about Uber’s history of hacking and spying on its competitors, though none of the critics of China I’ve encountered ever seem to want to address such flagrant rule-breaking on the US side of the Pacific.
Industrial espionage is everywhere
It’s safe to say that stealing intellectual property is staggeringly common across international markets, and it’s not too much of a stretch to say that the paranoia over Chinese firms is more ideologically driven than anything else. In my opinion, today’s partisan politics are starting to seriously cloud consumers’ minds, and we’ve done far too little to fight back against the surge of disinformation that seems to be targeting successful companies.
The paranoia…
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