U.S. defense officials estimate that the volume of confidential and proprietary material taken from the United States by sources headquartered in China could fill the Library of Congress more than 50 times over. Unsurprisingly, cybercrime has become the biggest danger to America’s technology edge abroad.
The consequences of hackers and spies infiltrating our mobile devices and gaining access to our data are immense.
As China’s cloud and mobile sectors expand internationally, so does the worry that sensitive information may fall into the hands of bad actors. This should motivate enterprises, governments, and consumers to place a higher value on data security standards in light of the broader security unknowns in a cloud context.
In late April, Nine Republicans in the Senate wrote to President Joe Biden, urging him to take action against cloud service providers like Huawei Cloud, who they see as a threat to national and economic security.
In a letter to the State, Commerce, and Treasury departments, Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) and eight others expressed concern that Huawei Cloud and other Chinese cloud computing companies engage with foreigners that directly challenge the security of America and its allies.
Concerns were expressed by Hagerty and eight other Republicans about the corporations’ ties to the Chinese military, government, and academic organizations. They also demanded that Baidu and Tencent, two other major cloud providers, be investigated by the Biden administration.
A growing trend of PRC-based cloud computing businesses partnering with entities directly damaging U.S. national security interests has lawmakers worried.
Chinese IT firms are also working to develop state-of-the-art AI at a frantic pace. As U.S. tech leaders suggest a pause to re-assess the dangers posed by AI, the suggestion seems moot because China shows no sign of slowing the tech wars.
The nine senator’s letter was written when relations between the United States and China were at an all-time high and companies with Chinese ties, such as TikTok, were under increased scrutiny in the United States capital.
The fear is that China can win a World War without firing a shot or anyone knowing they are in the war.
They ask that Biden make this looming crisis a top priority.
