Okay, but are American cars better from a security standpoint? I guess European cars are a valid option.
From an economic and domestic politics standpoint more trade with China is good, and maintaining what we have (like in canola and seafood) is imperative.
They were, yes, because the US was a trusted ally who shared a worldview, geopolitical interests and political ideal of democracy and other values. China never has. The US no longer does. Europe is the only other major car making economy that Canada shares values closely with but they aren’t making cheap EVs yet and may never.
More trade with China creates more opportunities for whatever their geopolitical goals are and empowers those efforts, including creating the kind of trade leverage the US has been using to force compliance. Canada must trade and the options are not ideal.
The US could conceivably do the same as I suspect China is doing, but the US government has to approach each manufacture and request or just take the data. Then they have to correlate it and so on. There was a recent writeup where someone found they could make themselves an admin (oops forgot to finish a sentence) on a US manufactures dealer network and use it to locate any vehicle sold since ~2015.
China has full access to any data collected by any business without red tape, and they are able to compel manufactures to include any feature they want.
Sure we can trade in raw materials and simple manufacturing but we need to stick to importing technology that was not designed by a country that has and will continue to be hostile to Canada.
(I think you started a thought and then forgot about it, there)
Yes, it’s definitely harder for the NSA to do NSA stuff than it would be for… eh, the CAC, apparently (maybe?), but obviously it hasn’t stopped the Americans. What we really should be doing is our own counterintelligence work, where we sweep imports for funny business. And importantly, impose the basic expectation that our hardware and software isn’t spying on us in the first place, although that would be a huge shift.
Yes, that goes for phones as well. The Americans have definitely been on the lookout for hardware trojans on computing devices. Probably us too in some capacity, being in the five eyes.
I have a feeling we’ll have much easier time getting Chinese manufacturers to comply with disabling telemetry for our market without being hit with sanctions than US.
That’s true too. I actually use a Chinese brand of phone, because guess what, most of the Western brands are locked down.
Obviously there’s exceptions like FairPhone, and there’s rumors Chinese silicon gets messed with. We don’t need them to pinky swear to anything we can verify, though. We just need them to agree, and unlike somebody they’re pragmatic enough to do so.
I started using a Fairphone recently actually. It’s an EU brand, sure, but the device and software is designed and made by T2 Mobile of Shanghai. So it’s essentially the same deal - Fairphone says “we want no telemetry” and T2 Mobile says “okay” and disables it. Behind all the pretences most brands work like this. Whether it’s only hardware, or software and hardware, or some mix, it all ultimately hinges on the Chinese supplier being pragmatic and doing what they were asked to do.
From Fairphone themselves:
This is the source tree from our hardware and software supplier T2Mobile.
I’m saying that because It’s how most manufacturing of western electronics works. We tell the Chinese manufacturer what to enable and what not to enable. Then we check (or don’t) and we sell it domestically.
Okay, but are American cars better from a security standpoint? I guess European cars are a valid option.
From an economic and domestic politics standpoint more trade with China is good, and maintaining what we have (like in canola and seafood) is imperative.
They were, yes, because the US was a trusted ally who shared a worldview, geopolitical interests and political ideal of democracy and other values. China never has. The US no longer does. Europe is the only other major car making economy that Canada shares values closely with but they aren’t making cheap EVs yet and may never.
More trade with China creates more opportunities for whatever their geopolitical goals are and empowers those efforts, including creating the kind of trade leverage the US has been using to force compliance. Canada must trade and the options are not ideal.
Hmm. Are European EVs more expensive than American ones? I thought they were similar.
The US could conceivably do the same as I suspect China is doing, but the US government has to approach each manufacture and request or just take the data. Then they have to correlate it and so on. There was a recent writeup where someone found they could make themselves an admin (oops forgot to finish a sentence) on a US manufactures dealer network and use it to locate any vehicle sold since ~2015.
China has full access to any data collected by any business without red tape, and they are able to compel manufactures to include any feature they want.
Sure we can trade in raw materials and simple manufacturing but we need to stick to importing technology that was not designed by a country that has and will continue to be hostile to Canada.
(I think you started a thought and then forgot about it, there)
Yes, it’s definitely harder for the NSA to do NSA stuff than it would be for… eh, the CAC, apparently (maybe?), but obviously it hasn’t stopped the Americans. What we really should be doing is our own counterintelligence work, where we sweep imports for funny business. And importantly, impose the basic expectation that our hardware and software isn’t spying on us in the first place, although that would be a huge shift.
Honestly I’d be less worried about my car spying on me than my phone but we import those from China almost exclusively.
Yes, that goes for phones as well. The Americans have definitely been on the lookout for hardware trojans on computing devices. Probably us too in some capacity, being in the five eyes.
I have a feeling we’ll have much easier time getting Chinese manufacturers to comply with disabling telemetry for our market without being hit with sanctions than US.
That’s true too. I actually use a Chinese brand of phone, because guess what, most of the Western brands are locked down.
Obviously there’s exceptions like FairPhone, and there’s rumors Chinese silicon gets messed with. We don’t need them to pinky swear to anything we can verify, though. We just need them to agree, and unlike somebody they’re pragmatic enough to do so.
That’s right.
I started using a Fairphone recently actually. It’s an EU brand, sure, but the device and software is designed and made by T2 Mobile of Shanghai. So it’s essentially the same deal - Fairphone says “we want no telemetry” and T2 Mobile says “okay” and disables it. Behind all the pretences most brands work like this. Whether it’s only hardware, or software and hardware, or some mix, it all ultimately hinges on the Chinese supplier being pragmatic and doing what they were asked to do.
From Fairphone themselves:
Src
That is highly doubtful. The challenges would be different but I’m skeptical it would be any easier.
I’m saying that because It’s how most manufacturing of western electronics works. We tell the Chinese manufacturer what to enable and what not to enable. Then we check (or don’t) and we sell it domestically.