This is a bit of a tangent but even Singapore might eventually change. From what I've been hearing out of there is that there is some discontent with the younger Lee especially since he doesn't posess the charisma or ability of the older one. Also Singaporeans themselves for awhile have realized the limits of their authoritarian system to provide innovations. Starting back in the mid-90's they have been engaged in a creativity project to figure out how to make their society more creative. From what I have heard from some people who have worked on it is that its not going too well due to the controlled nature of Singaporean society.
I think there is something to this and I find it somewhat fishy that Google would pull out just over a few acts of espionage. I find it fishy too that Google would pull out because they are losing to Baidu. Even a 20% share of the Chinese market is a lot of money and its a long way from saying that Google is doomed to Baidu especially when it is superior to Baidu in worldwide searches and as the Chinese get more worldly are going to to want to be plugged in with worldwide searches. At this point I don't even have any sound speculation on what is going on but I suspect there might be some other issues over what Google is doing.
So could China, but the majority of mainland Chinese do not have Singapore's living standards and infrastructure.
Me neither. All of these don't make any business sense. I don't believe for a second that Google is quiting b/c it wants to protect those activists and willing to stick it to the Chinese govt. CCP's censorship over the internet has long existed before 2006 when Google decided to part in the Chinese market. Why dance with the "devil" then but not now? The "devil" is still the same and it's not like Google has fighted CCP from day 1 of Google.cn. For large part, Google complied . On the other hand, the Google books in China is also overblown, imo. Frankly, I don't think Google is treated fairly on this issue. It has been made out as if Google would put copyrighted Chinese author's book available for download w/o permission. At best the infringement is a large scale unauthorized scanning (106 reproduction right) only incurred to the book authors. The feud on this issue is not between Google and the Chinese book authors whose rights are potentially violated, but rather between Google and government backed author's guild sort of speak. Google is making some legit challenge on who really owns the reproduction right. The Google books is a good thing, IMO, and the Chinese government, which seems to take a strong utilitarian approach, should agree. Also, China is never known as big on protecting book author's copyright anyways. So what's this Google violating Chinese author's copyright all about, when in fact there is a greater benefit than the harm? Seems to me China wants Google to bow to its pressure and Google, having a well documented arrogant management, finally decided to fight back. In the end, I think Google will stay in China once the cooler minds of the business people step in and share holders show their disapproval in the stock price.
More like I'm Yao to your Hakeem wannabe. As I've always said, I don't just call you a moron. I prove that you are a moron. I've just done that here by tearing your lousy excuse for argument to shreds. Emotionally defending the Chinese government? You mean emotionally defending what the Chinese government didn't do right? Believe me, there is a huge difference. What I've seen in this thread is you hurling allegations and hypothesizing alleged Chinese government involvement and have yet to own up and a shred of evidence. You'll excuse me I don't take that credibly. And the "Dalai coloured glasses" remark, when it comes to good ole SammyFisher, happens to be right on. There are more than a handful of post history giving credence to just that. Feel free to use the search function, if you actually care. Define China? Which "China" is hacking? The Chinese government? The spy agency? Some college kid in a dorm room? A professional hacker for the challenge? A professional hacker for profit motive? A professional hacker who just happens to be evil? In each of those cases you listed above, the Chinese government did not deny the occurrence or non-occurrence of alleged hacking activities. It denied American government alleged governmental/army involvement. And once again, there is a HUGE difference. Couple of month back, a bunch of American hackers hacked into a bunch of Chinese servers/computers/websites and a bunch of Chinese hackers responded. The result was a cross-border poo-flinging contest that lasted for days. Did the Chinese government allege American governmental involvement? Speaks volumes. I didn't make the words. I use them. There was a time when I used those words a little bit more liberally. But pretty soon I've found out that there are morons out there more than willing to stretch the meaning a wee bit. So now I use the precise definition. Don't think the word conveys the message you're trying to send? Use a different one. I can pretty much summarized what you said above in the in one phrase, that you can hurl allegations while it's up to the Chinese government to prove they are innocent. And evidence is not simply a difference in opinion. It is a concrete fact, not up to interpretations. It is your interpretation of the evidence that is the opinion. So far you've shown an interpretation with no evidence. The only logical conclusion is that you've already made up your mind before seeing such non-existent evidence, which is why you are out arguing Occam's Razor instead of who did what when and where. Nope. I fully expected you expect them to say, "yup, we did it." You've made more than a handful of accusations yourself. So you believe the Occam's Razor is that the Chinese government hacked google to allegedly get access to the e-mail accounts of two human right activists? Which one is more difficult to hack, google's server or some guy's personal computer? And you believe they do this to obtain information they already have while looking bad in the process? If you believe that's the most logical conclusion, I don't know what to tell ya. Fact of the matter is, they don't need to hack google to access your e-mail. They could stall a keystroke logger. They don't need to have somebody next door to hear you, they could tap your phone. They don't need to have somebody follow you 24/7 to know you're talking to CNN. I've no doubt that China has a cyber army, like the rest of the world. But that is irrelevant. The only thing relevant is did they hack google.
Usually when Sammy pulls out the moronic netizen argument, the debate is over. He lost. But alright, another perspective. Got an e-mail from an acquaintance of mine in China. Works for Microsoft. American. White. Decided to transfer to China a couple of years ago. His office is several minutes walk from Google China. He went there today (well, Chinese time today) and snapped a couple of photos on his cell phone. That's as close to first hand resource as you're gonna get. His opinion? Google's quitting the market because they could hack (pun intended) it over there and that the Chinese government is not involved in the hackings. Actually he made an interesting note. He said that while the western media interpret the placement of flowers and fruit on the google plaque as a sign of good will, he noted that Chinese people place those items on a tombstone. No doubt more than a bit of gloating from a rival. So while we are all thinking what happened. Think about that. Of course it is inconceivable to Sammy the moron that there could be an alternative explanation, so no doubt he'll conclude he's brainwashed by the Chinese government like the rest of the brainwashed sock-puppets.
Btw, before I forget, this acquaintance of mine used to use gmail as recent as three or four month back. Not any more. Apparently his gmail account was hacked in a US sourced attack. Apparently google's vulnerabilities are global.
from Ars Technica: [rquoter] Researchers identify command servers behind Google attack VeriSign iDefense researchers have identified the source of the recent cyber-assault against Google and have found the command-and-control servers that were used to orchestrate the attack. VeriSign's iDefense security lab has published a report with technical details about the recent cyberattack that hit Google and over 30 other companies. The iDefense researchers traced the attack back to its origin and also identified the command-and-control servers that were used to manage the malware. The cyber-assault came to light on Tuesday when Google disclosed to the public that the Gmail Web service was targeted in a highly-organized attack in late December. Google said that the intrusion attempt originated from China and was executed with the goal of obtaining information about political dissidents, but the company declined to speculate about the identity of the perpetrator. Citing sources in the defense contracting and intelligence consulting community, the iDefense report unambiguously declares that the Chinese government was, in fact, behind the effort. The report also says that the malicious code was deployed in PDF files that were crafted to exploit a vulnerability in Adobe's software. "The source IPs and drop server of the attack correspond to a single foreign entity consisting either of agents of the Chinese state or proxies thereof," the report says. The researchers have determined that there are significant similarities between the recent attack and a seemingly related one that was carried out in July against a large number of US companies. Both attacks were apparently managed through the same command-and-control servers. "The servers used in both attacks employ the HomeLinux DynamicDNS provider, and both are currently pointing to IP addresses owned by Linode, a US-based company that offers Virtual Private Server hosting. The IP addresses in question are within the same subnet, and they are six IP addresses apart from each other," the report says. "Considering this proximity, it is possible that the two attacks are one and the same, and that the organizations targeted in the Silicon Valley attacks have been compromised since July." If the report's findings are correct, it suggests that the government of China has been engaged for months in a massive campaign of industrial espionage against US companies. Update: Adobe disputes iDefense's claim that PDFs were used to deploy the malware. In a statement issued today, Adobe says that they have found no evidence that their technology was used as an attack vector in this recent incident. This is supported by independent research conducted by security firm McAfee, which has found evidence that a vulnerability in Internet Explorer—but not Acrobat Reader—was exploited in the attack. [/rquoter]
They are wrong. The attack was an exploitation of a zero-day vulnerability in Internet explorer, not PDF: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/01/hack-of-adob Adobe of course, denied the PDF exploit, but of course, have a profit motive. McAfee however, backed them up: http://siblog.mcafee.com/cto/operation-“aurora”-hit-google-others/ Kinda throw the credibility of the rest of the still unpublished report to the dogs. I look forward to reading it. Seems like Adobe in just another victim. Rest of the report is speculation at best. [/QUOTE] Speculation at best. I'm wondering how they bridge the gap between:
Man, I go out of my way to explain the difference between proof and evidence and you ignore it. Jeez. And now you're putting words in my mouth. My opinion is that the Chinese govt or agents thereof committed the sophisticated attack which Google reported. I am aware that I don't have proof that they did or did not. Neither do you. I don't think it's up to to the Chinese government to prove it's innocence. I believe it is perfectly possible that there are other causes of/explanations for the attack. I'm just another guy on the internet with an opinion. It seems to me you've spent some time in here slugging it out with guys over related topics before (there's obviously a grudge with sam that predates this thread), and I'd like to remind you that I'm not those guys. I'm humble enough to know that I could be entirely wrong in my assumption, and I'm fine with being wrong. My debate with you is over what I think is the most likely explanation, not what actually happened. I'm not so arrogant to claim that I truly know what happened, nor have I ever anywhere in this thread, and for you to accuse me of such is putting words in my mouth. I don't invoke Occam's Razor in order to say I know The Truth. We don't know what actually happened and may never know. We're just guys on an internet forum gathering information, combining it with previous knowledge (bias) and making guesses and assumptions. If you want to split hairs about evidence and proof, there's no way either of us can prove that there was any attack at all. The entire story could be a fabrication. To some extent, both of us take some elements of this story for granted as true. It would both appear we agree that someone tried to hack Google. If we're going to split hairs of hairs as to what is truly, absolutely TRUE... there will be no moving forward. We do not have access to proof, so we will gather articles and statements from people who supposedly do, using that as supposed proof, and then there will likely be counter arguments and statements from each side. "See! Look at this link! The Chinese government lied!" "No! Look here! Google lied!" Meh. The more productive debate is to admit we take certain things for granted as fact. How so? My point is that any attacker can claim innocence after an attack, because the origin of cyber attacks are by their nature hard to prove. How does the above change that? Absolutely, considering their past history. And for the fourth time, they are the party most interested in tracking Chinese human rights activists. As for the "two email accounts", it's funny that you belittle the attack when you've already noted elsewhere in the thread that you know the attack reached over thirty companies and many email accounts. Google did not say how many; they said that only two were compromised. However, it is in their best interest to belittle the extent of the breach of security. Certainly the personal computer would be far easier. I've read that both types of attacks were employed. Are you insisting only one type can take place? You're not making sense. It is perfectly within the Chinese govts' ability to make a sophisticated attack. This is actually funny. Looking bad? Really? For years the Chinese government has been making itself look bad on the treatment of human rights activists and have made far more egregious affronts while claiming innocence or that nothing happened whatsoever- and they suffer nothing for it except loss of credibility. If your defense of the Chinese government is that they don't want to "look bad", then I don't know what to tell you. The idea that they would consider being busted in an attack on corporate servers a PR nightmare in light of their previous history is just humorous.
This is interesting. I don't think it will matter, but I didn't expect this. http://www.businessweek.com/news/20...protest-to-china-over-google-cyberattack.html U.S. Will Protest to China Over Google Cyber Attack January 15, 2010, 11:24 AM EST By Indira A.R. Lakshmanan Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. will issue a formal protest to the Chinese government over the cyber attack on Google Inc. that the company says originated from China. “We will be issuing a formal demarche in Beijing,” likely early next week, to express U.S. concern about the incident, State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said in Washington. In the protest, the U.S. will demand that China explain the attack that Mountain View, California-based Google says targeted its Web site and the e-mail accounts of Chinese dissidents. Google, which owns the most popular Internet search engine, has said it plans to stop censoring results in China and may leave the Chinese market over the attack. The Chinese Embassy in Washington couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on the planned U.S. action. David Shear, the deputy assistant secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific, met with the Chinese Embassy’s deputy chief of mission in Washington yesterday to express concern and ask questions. Shear didn’t receive answers to his questions, according to a U.S. official who requested anonymity. Google said the attack, which occurred last month, included theft of its intellectual property and hacking into the e-mail accounts of rights activists, and that it targeted at least 20 other “large” companies in technology, finance and chemicals. U.S. ‘Backsliding’ China’s Ministry of Commerce today charged the U.S. with “backsliding” toward protectionism and said companies must comply with foreign laws in the aftermath of Google Inc.’s threat to pull out of the country. Google briefed the Obama administration before it took action. Representatives of the company spoke with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about the matter last week and had discussions with Obama’s national security advisers, according to administration officials. Google didn’t seek U.S. government help and administration officials didn’t encourage or argue against proceeding, the aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said. The night that Google publicly disclosed its intention to stop censoring its site in China, Clinton called for the Chinese government to explain attacks on Google’s Chinese Web site. The administration was publicly treating the matter as a part of the regular give-and-take in bilateral relations. Google approached other companies to seek their help drawing attention to the cyber attack last month and was frustrated by their reluctance to come forward, according to a person familiar with the matter. Google wanted other companies that were attacked to talk about the incident, the person said. Those companies refused, and Google made the announcement by itself, the person said. Google traded at $586.84 a share, down 3 percent, at 11:15 a.m. in New York.
Actually - the better explanation (posted in slate, among other places) is that Google's user base in China are the same people who are far more tech savvy than your average Baidu using, chain-smoking sheep Netizen, who thinks that Jackie Chan was right and that if he had too much freedom he would spend it all whacking it to J-pr0n and reading Perez Hilton while GDP suffers, rather than doing productive tasks like mining Warcraft treasures and re-selling them on ebay...and hence use google's services anyway without censorship by circumventing the Gr8 F1r3wall.
Ouch, this is not for Google. It doesn't want to get caught in the crossfire of diplomatic battle between US and China, the Copenhagen Weng Jiabo refusing Obama to attend the meeting and this now.
Google was making little money in China. Chinese government wouldn't allow certain content (p*rn, Dalai Lama) in search engines. Google got hacked (by who?). Google now "fights back" (by quitting). About time.
That's fine. Your opinion, my opinion, just keep in mind that it is an opinion. That's just it. You expressed an opinion (not fact) that the Chinese government is behind it. I opined that they are most likely not behind it. Once again, nothing more, nothing less. The fact that evidence is difficult to obtain is precisely the reason why criminal procedures take so damn long. That is the case here too. If Hilary Clinton is to seek an explanation from Wen Jiabao for hacking, she'd better be pretty damn sure the Chinese government is behind it. Otherwise she'd look like a damn fool. If there was an attack (and I think there was), then there would be an attacker, who has thus far not come forward, that much is fact. What you did however, is speculate as to whom the attacker was, and you accused the Chinese government. I've already made it abundantly clear that even if an attack originated in China, it does not mean that the Chinese government is involved. What each of those articles claimed is that the Chinese government is behind those attacks, offering no proofs. The onus is not on the Chinese government to prove they are innocent. It is on their accusers to prove that they are guilty. If they can't prove it, well... Which past history would that be? The past history of their alleged but still non-proven hackings? If we go by that logic, I think you are understating the Chinese government's crimes. They have not sufficiently proven that they are innocent to all crimes in the Chinese code of law. Let's start small shall we? Something like pick-pockieting or petty theft. Let's have the Chinese government prove that they've never committed petty theft, otherwise they are guilty. Once again, the point for the chinese government to carry out a sophisticateed attack to get access to information they already have is...? The chinese government never was good at propa, ahem, PR and opinion guidance, but they've also not had a history of doing something outright stupid. In the case of their censorship and other abuses, don't think they didn't weigh their options. They engage in their activities because if they can drum up and maintain decent support in China, they don't give a ***** what people on the outside like you and me think. If they attacked google though, they are gonna look bad both domestically and abroad. They don't do dumb **** like that. Once again, they allegedly carried out attacks on corporate servers previously. Once you've sufficently proven that they've carried out previous attack, then you can come back and tell me how they have a history. But you'd still have to prove they carried this one. That would have been hilarious joke if it wasn't so sad Sammy. I've heard about the so called more sophisticated google users. You don't suppoe I could get a definition of what "sophisticate" means in this case and get a count do you? I mean, are they as sophisticated as those beer-gutted buck-toothed sheep-lovin' swingin' rednecks? Or a drugged up pregnant by 14 inner city bum? But you are absolutely right about Jackie Chan. Who the ***** is he when you could be tweeting (believe me, four weeks ago I didn't know what that meant) about Brangelina and looking over Paris HIlton sex tapes. I sure hope those sophisticated users were able to circumvent the Green Dam and the former goolge censorship.
Agreed. I wonder what exactly this "formal protest" from the US govt will be. On the other hand, Secretary Clinton and former secretaries of state from the US have already tangled with the PRC over human rights abuses several times, so it isn't like there's a frictionless relationship. I found it very interesting that Google reportedly went to all of these different corporations sharing the information of the attack, and none of the other companies would join them in reporting it. Only a few have come forward to even confirm that it happened. I imagine several wouldn't want confidence shaken in their business if they admitted they were compromised, but it seems that bigger than that- they absolutely don't want to piss off China. Agreed. Actually I wasn't referring to those alleged attacks when I mentioned past history (though the list is very long and comes from a host of nations that do not share priorities or allegiance.) I was referring to their past history on human rights abuses- the arresting and imprisonment of political dissidents, for one. I think a computer hack is small fry by comparison, as far as soiling your own international reputation goes. But you said it best: Exactly. I count this as another reason why the "they don't want to look bad" defense doesn't hold. It's simple: - A computer attack will be difficult, if not impossible to prove. If formally accused, China can simply "no, we didn't." It will be he said/she said and the usual suspects will take sides. - China has done far worse than some alleged computer hacking to sully it's international reputation; it has never admitted wrongdoing, and has never suffered any consequences (other than lost credibility) for it because - Nobody on earth wants to **** with China. For someone who is a stickler for proof, you're making a lot of assumptions here. I've read that the attack on the corporate infrastructure of Google included the stealing of IP, and also a keyword search function to find gmail usernames that might reveal more political dissidents. In other words, find even more Chinese activists that they don't know of already- worldwide. You seem to be assuming (from the mention of tapping phones) that they are only spying within their borders (which I agree they can do very effectively, just as the US does on it's citizens.) One of the two email accounts compromised belonged to a student at a US university. Point being, the power and range of this attack most certainly could give them information they don't already have via domestic spying or keylogging/botnets. Really? Why would they look bad domestically? Again, if accused, they can just claim innocence and their citizens will side with them. And even if they lose cred with outsiders, are any other companies going to leave? Hell no. There are estimates that over 30 corporations had IP stolen or attempted stolen. Not one single company other than Google has dared to even complain. btw your posts are well written, much appreciated.
Two governments incessently bickering about this and that due to self-interest is as natural as it gets. I'd imagine that you haven't followed the events carefully. The majority of those companies did confirm those attacks. Google is the one getting all the attention because it squealed the loudest Fine. But once again, history means nothing. I've already made my position quite clear. I think it was two years ago when I gave the following example. Bob Joe is a serial rapist who raped every woman in town except Sue. The one night Sue got raped and Bob Joe got hanged. Same case here. It doesn't matter if the Chinese government did or did not violate human rights in the past. All that matters is did it in this case. But it looks like you are measuring the rope already. Obviously you've never been to China. You are not familiar with the degree the Chinese community, and especially the online community (important participant in this case), distrusts the government. Anybody with a connection could spread a rumour about some dark event carried out by the Chinese government tonight and by morning it will have spread like wildfire, all without a shred of proof, false, taken at face value. In fact, for large segments of the population, the Chinese government is always at fault. And that's when it was a lie. If it turned out to be true... So the claim that the Chinese government suffers no consequences is patently false. This is a high risk low reward (if any) action for them, if indeed carried out by them. Contrary to what you've said, I've not made any assumptions at all. When the first news broke, the first thing I thought was industrial espionage by a rival. Then I recalled the arms sale and found a nationalistic hacker would be another plausible explanation. Several others also arose but you can understand if I don't go into each in detail. And yes, I did consider the possibility that the Chinese government did it, which you can see that I found unlikely. It was only when morons and chronic liars like good ole SammyFisher pared off the details of the rest of the attack (such as 30 other companies being hacked, IP/source code being stolen) and insinuating the CCP is doing it to keep tabs on human rights activists and google being entirely altruistic did I focus my arguments. Because by that point there already was nothing more to argue otherwise. The rest of the detail has already been cast into a black hole. And I'm curious, why do you think it's more difficult for the Chinese government to keep track of a US based e-mail than a Chinese based one? The connection has to eventually reach China, a Chinese ISP, a Chinese server, a computer located in China. The Chinese government cannot shut down that US based server, but they can block it. They register the Chinese ISP, the Chinese servers. They control the physical lines in which information from those servers are delivered to a house in China. If "human rights activist" wants to access that e-mail in China, it goes through a gauntlet. I'm also even more curious, what in a human right activist's e-mail is so damn time sensitive that they have to know right away? Well I suppose there are some things in which time is of the essence, such as potential terrorist attacks or espionage activities. But in that case I think the Chinese government is perfectly justified keeping track of them. See above. And once again, I need to stress, google is getting the media attention because they squealed the loudest. The second most effected party for example (which would be Adobe) had already confirmed they've been hacked, denied their PDF was used as the tool for the attack and had been vindicated that they were indeed not at fault. Once again, that long line of events got lost in the noise. When I perceive the other party is making a logical and reasonable argument instead of poo-fling, I take the time and effort to respond in kind. When I get one of Sammy's worthless rants, I respond in kind too. Personally I prefer well thought arguments too but unfortunately you don't always get it that way.
