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By Martin Brampton, 25 October 2007 11:13

COMMENT

From cheap laptops to budget routers, China's low-cost products have helped bolster economic stability in the West. So, Martin Brampton asks, what's really fuelling the wave of criticism against the current workshop of the world?

For the past decade, Chinese workers have toiled away creating cheap goods for the world, not least in the IT sector. There's even a sneaking suspicion that the relative economic stability of the period may owe more to Chinese low prices than to politicians, or to whatever virtues we wish to claim for ourselves.

But lately, perhaps because the Chinese have become a little restless, they have become the target of a range of complaints. Justified? Or a mixture of paranoia and scapegoating?

A lot of prominence was given to claims of poor quality in Chinese manufacturing. Look closer and the picture turns out to be less clear-cut.

The huge US toymaker Mattel recently had to withdraw large numbers of toys that had been made in China. Widespread coverage created the impression that poor standards in China were the cause of the problem. Yet Mattel later conceded that 87 per cent of the recalls were the result of faulty design and had nothing to do with quality of manufacturing.

It seems impossible to come by reliable data on rates of failure for new IT equipment. But anecdotal evidence suggests that the number of items shipped with faults that either prevent them working at all, or result in early failures, has increased sharply. Again, there is a temptation to blame the manufacturing - which often took place in China.

But the Mattel case indicates that we should be cautious about jumping to conclusions. We also need to be realistic. The low cost of goods manufactured in a number of Asian countries appeals to us very much.

Yet we know very well that these countries not only have low wage costs, they also have a much more rudimentary regulatory environment than the old industrialised countries.

If we choose to use them to gain the benefit of low-cost goods, we must also accept there are risks in a loosely regulated manufacturing environment.

What's more, dead-on-arrival goods don't seem to cause the slightest surprise to manufacturers. The cynical conclusion is that they have decided to ship them out improperly tested and leave it to the customer to sort out any problems.

That surely has to be, like the Mattel case, at least as much a matter of the specification of quality controls as an issue about manufacturing.

Faulty toys are one thing but in recent weeks the Chinese have been cast as a dire threat to our security because of alleged attacks carried out across the internet. Dramatic claims have been made that hackers within China's military have been finding routes into systems that are vital to the US aircraft carrier fleet.

According to RSA's most recent fraud report "China has leapt into second place in the global ranks of countries hosting the most attacks". We are, it seems, under attack from foreigners.

Are we to take any of this seriously? After all, there is a lot of hacking out there. Despite having a far smaller population than China, the US remains firmly in the top hacker hosting position, where it has been since record-keeping began.

Unsurprisingly, China has made similar accusations against computers based in the US. For example, last month a senior Chinese official accused foreign agencies of causing massive damage by hacking into Chinese computers for political, military and scientific secrets. Some also expected to see an attack on China coming from Japan on the anniversary of the Japanese surrender in World War II.

There is also a continual rumble of criticism of China's regard for internet censorship. Certainly, the Chinese government is intolerant of criticism and blocks internet material it doesn't like.

Like most censorship, Chinese efforts on the internet appear to be erratic and inconsistent. One must ask exactly how effective they are.

I wonder just how seriously we should take any of these complaints against China. It would be very surprising if we found that any country that has sufficient resources is not attempting to poke holes into other countries' security. And denying that they do it. And accusing everybody else of doing it.

Yet most hacking is almost certainly aimed at financial gain. It ranges from the familiar phishing attacks, to attempts at extracting commercially valuable secrets from major companies. Again, this kind of activity is more or less universal - with companies all over the world having been found in possession of improperly obtained data.

Cynical observers even doubt whether the attribution of attacks to China is reliable. Some security experts have pointed out just how difficult and unreliable it is to locate the source of hacks.

Hackers naturally do their best to cover their tracks and this tends to be easier in the less sophisticated environment of rapidly developing countries. So there is a natural tendency for attacks to seem to come from developing countries, even though this may mask the true situation.

Censorship is an emotive subject and we are strongly committed to our notion of free speech. Yet censorship isn't the only threat we need to worry about. While the precise reasons may be different, it's notable that young people in China make comments which show a lack of interest in politics that is not too different from their Western contemporaries.

It seems many young people everywhere have little belief that politics affects their lives and feel they have more pressing concerns.

Even though I remain very attached to freedom from censorship, I have to admit some controls have appeal.

When my electronic mail is cluttered up every day with requests for my banking details, advice to buy worthless shares, encouragement to embark on internet gambling and exhortations to take dubious drugs to enhance my sex life, I'd welcome a certain amount of censorship. The Chinese have some justification for describing a lot of what hits most email boxes as "degenerate".

It is a changing world and Asia is an increasingly important part of it. Of course, nobody should be above criticism. But recent Sinophobia looks unbalanced and very weakly justified. We've plenty of more substantial problems to feed our paranoia.