Dr. Richard Shurtz calling in from Beijing, China Tech Talk Guest Ancient Chinese Technology Communications Facts about China Cell Phone Technology in China Chinese Control of 3G Cell Phone Standards Causes Deployment Delays Update: Internet Content Blocking in China Discovering How is the Filtering Performed? China Fails to Ban Nude Web Chats US Files Piracy Charges Against China at WTO Update: Software Piracy in Beijing China China Will Permit FDA Inspection of Pet Food Suppliers Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft Criticized for Cooperating with Chinese Government China Source of More Computer Viruses Than Any Other Country
Using IP phone connection from Traders Hotel at China World Trade Center
9 PM Saturday night in China is 9 AM in Washington DC
One time zone in all of China (Should be five, but central government wants everyone on Beijing time)
Eastern region along the sea is most developed
Borders Yellow sea, East China Sea, South China Sea
Includes( Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong)
Western region inland is less developed
Borders ( Mongolia, Kazakhstan, India, Burma)
Primarily agricultural and not sharing wealth of the east
Education currently an important government priority
Top universities are competitive worldwide
Mid-level universities striving to increase standards
Emphasis on vocational education for economic development
Tech Talk Guest
Dr. James Flaggert
Dean of Business Administration and Graduate Studies
Stratford University
Ancient Chinese Technology
The sciences of astronomy, physics, chemistry, meteorology, seismology, technology, engineering, and mathematics can trace their early origins to China
From 600 AD until 1500 AD, China was the world’s most technologically Advanced society
Scholars routinely discovered scientific principles, invented new technologies, and influenced the development of human civilizations around the world.
Four of these revolutionary Chinese technologies: printing, paper making, gunpowder, and the magnetic compass
Printing and paper making impacted record-keeping and learning for Chinese society
The invention of gunpowder gave the Chinese a distinct advantage over their enemies, changing the nature of warfare
The compass enabled trade and exploration in whole new ways
Inventions in other areas
Agriculture (Growing crops in rows, iron plow, rotary winnow fan)
Engineering (cast iron, chain pump, deep drilling of natural gas, mechanical clock, segmental arch bridge, and belt-drive)
Domestic and Industrial (lacquer, paper, matches, printing, paper money)
Mathematics (Refined value of Pi, Pascal’s triangle, the problem of bamboo)
Physics (First law of motion, seismograph, first compass)
It supports data transmission at speeds up to 2 Mbps
It combines time division multiple access (TDMA) with adaptive, synchronous-mode code division multiple access (CDMA).
Protocol offers the unique spectrum efficiency of CDMA combined with the possibility of asymmetric data-transfer given by the TDMA frame structure.
TD-SCDMA was developed by the China Academy of Telecommunications Technology (CATT) in collaboration with Datang and Siemens
Operators need enough time to have 3G networks up and running before the Summer Olympic Games in Beijing in August, 2008. Unfortunately, the standard is still in tests.
The government doesn’t want to allow any 3G in China until work on the Chinese-developed standard is complete.
Other home-grown standards backed by the Chinese government include:
Radio frequency ID (RFID) chips
Mobile TV
Wireless broadband
Optical Disk formats – EVD (enhanced versatile disk) instead of DVD
This trend goes beyond commercial and security concerns. Cultural pride is at stake.
Update: Internet Content Blocking in China
China blocks sites that are deemed politically sensitive or pornographic
They also block well known proxy services that can be used to circumvent the filters
Used several free proxy services that did not include VPN encryption
Could reach the banned web site without a problem
After about 10 minutes of surfing, the connection was blocked!
Found a VPN proxy service that was not blocked. A 30 day subscription was $10. Would have probably permitted undetected surfing.
Discovering How is the Filtering Performed?
No filtering of DNS response. Discovered using ping command.
Then I checked the network response the Trace Route command.
In command window type: tracert www.stratford.edu
Takes twelve hops to leave China
Hops 10, 11, 12 are filtering devices (adds 335 ms delay)
Transfers to Cogent Communications backbone (hops 13 to 21)
Final hops in US (hops 22 to 25)
Telefonica backbone
Infinity backbone
In command window type: tracert www.wikipedia.org
Takes same hops in China
10th Hop reports: Destination Host Unreachable (first filter)
In command windows type: tracert www.globallandcoalition.org
Takes same hops in China
11th Hop reports: Destination Host Unreachable (second filter)
China Fails to Ban Nude Web Chats
The Chinese have failed to end nude web chats after discovering "there was no basis in law to bring charges" against a housewife who arranged nude chat groups via web cams.
The 36-year-old woman, known only by her surname Li, was charged with "organizing pornographic activities", by using a web cam for nude chats and setting up online group encounters for nudists.
Investigators discovered that "nude chat rooms were not defined in China’s pornography laws", an oversight described as a legal "blind spot".
A court in the Beijing rejected the case, and prosecutors withdrew the charge, saying that: "Under existing laws, it is inappropriate to treat this as a criminal offence."
US Files Piracy Charges Against China at WTO
The United States filed two new cases against China at the WTO on April 10, challenging Beijing’s lax enforcement of copyright and trademark protections
Action alleges failure to remove import and distribution restrictions on copyrighted U.S. goods including newspapers, magazines and video games.
Beijing says it is stepping up its fight against product piracy and has heavily criticized Washington for starting the intellectual property case
China says the WTO action could damage trade relations between US and China countries.
Update: Software Piracy in Beijing China
Place: IT Software Mart
Banner above front door (in Chinese): Protect IPR, crackdown on software piracy
What does it mean?: Pirated software is under the counter
Software purchased, boxed with serial numbers (Chinese language edition)
MS Windows XP Professional — 18 RMB ($2.32US)
MS Office Professional — 18 RMB ($2.32US)
MS Vista Enterprise Edition — 18 RMB ($2.32US)
Macromedia Dreamweaver Suite — 18 RMB ($2.32US)
Software purchased, with serial number but no box (English Language edition)
MS Windows Enterprise Edition – 10 RMB ($1.30US)
Conclusion: Still awaiting the crackdown.
China Will Permit FDA Inspection of Pet Food Suppliers
China will allow FDA inspectors into the country to investigate the Chinese manufacturers who are selling melamine tainted wheat gluten, corn gluten, and rice protein complex to US pet food manufacturing companies.
Melamine raises the nitrogen level in these products, and the nitrogen level is tested to determine protein content.
The price the company can charge is based on protein content, so a higher nitrogen level raises the price the company can charge for the product.
Investigators believe the Chinese companies deliberately added melamine to the products to raise the price.
FDA has opened a criminal investigation into the pet food tragedy
The incident has brought to light the lack of regulation and oversight of the manufacturing of pet foods.
Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft Criticized for Cooperating with Chinese Government
Amnesty International criticized Google, Microsoft and Yahoo of violating their corporate principles in China.
In a report titled "Undermining Freedom of Expression in China," the human rights group says that the companies have bowed to censorship demands from China’s ruling Communist Party.
But its Yahoo.cn operation has cooperated with Chinese authorities and filters its Chinese search results.
Earlier this year the Google.cn search engine that does not display certain Web sites disliked by Chinese officials. (Google does not inform users of the delistings.)
Yahoo provided information used to convict Shi Tao, a 37-year-old journalist, of leaking "state secrets."
Yahoo also turned over information that led to the arrest of Li Zhi, a 35-year-old former civil servant from the southwestern province of Dazhou. He was convicted and sentenced to an eight-year prison sentence in 2003.
Yahoo said in a statement that it has been working with human-rights organizations and government officials to craft better industry policies in nations such as China.
Microsoft said it would be unable to comment on Wednesday.
China Source of More Computer Viruses Than Any Other Country
Sophos reports that China accounts for 41.1% of the world’s total viruses.
China averaged 5000 virus-infected web pages each day during the last quarter
The United States is a close second with 29.2%.
The nine most serious virus-infested web site hosting countries are China (41.1%); the U.S. (29.2%); Russia (4.6%); Germany (4.6%); Ukraine (3.9%); Britain (3.0%); France (2.2%); Netherlands (1.9%); and South Korea (1.3%).