Okay, who’s getting fired? Is it a lot of folks? Because it certainly should be. China steals up to $600 billion dollars in US IP every year and three U.S. firms (Quicksilver Manufacturing Inc, Rapid Cut LLC and U.S. Prototype Inc.) are making it incredibly easy for them to do so.
Don’t think it’s a serious problem? How about this from CBS News…
“A yearslong malicious cyber operation spearheaded by the notorious Chinese state actor, APT 41, has siphoned off an estimated trillions in intellectual property theft from approximately 30 multinational companies within the manufacturing, energy and pharmaceutical sectors.”
State sanctioned. Trillions in intellectual property.
“We’re talking about Blueprint diagrams of fighter jets, helicopters, and missiles,” Cybereason CEO Lior Div told CBS News. In pharmaceuticals, “we saw them stealing IP of drugs around diabetes, obesity, depression.” The campaign has not yet been stopped, according to CBS.
So China wants stuff and so they take stuff —illegally and at a detriment to the U.S. economy. And now we have three U.S. companies just sending them the stuff, no malicious cyber operation required. Well, Uncle Sam finally decided to crack down on these companies.
According to Fox News, “The U.S. Commerce Department says the three companies…received blueprints for satellite, rocket and defense prototypes from U.S. companies, but then sent those blueprints to Chinese companies for 3-D printing.”
Smart, fellas. Real smart.
“Outsourcing 3-D printing of space and defense prototypes to China harms U.S. national security,” Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Export Enforcement Matthew Axelrod said in a statement. “By sending their customers’ technical drawings and blueprints to China, these companies may have saved a few bucks, but they did so at the collective expense of protecting U.S. military technology.”
Uh, yeah. And now the government has suspended the export privileges for Quicksilver Manufacturing Inc, Rapid Cut LLC and U.S. Prototype Inc. for 180 days which, let’s be honest, seems like a slap on the wrist for enriching and empowering our enemies while sabotaging our own economy. They’re getting off easy for a bunch of Benedict Arnolds.
Former President Donald Trump knew this was a huge problem, and conducted a probe that found Chinese theft of U.S. intellectual property (IP) amounted to $225-600 billion every year.
This is also why he founded the China Initiative. In 2018, President Donald Trump and his DOJ took aim at Chinese national security threats: economic aggressions, trade espionage, intellectual property theft, cyber crime —all of it.
But then Biden’s DOJ shut it down. Trillions lost to our enemies. U.S. companies handing over military blueprints —not an issue.
We’re going after school moms and dads now.
