China’s great technological decoupling from the West continues apace. The latest broadside from Beijing is aimed at blocking U.S. and Israeli cybersecurity vendors, reportedly over fears that their wares might leak Chinese information to governments or third parties. The report comes from Reuters and cites two unnamed sources “briefed on the matter.” At this point, there’s no telling which Chinese companies or state agencies have been issued this directive, but chances are that the list includes large state-owned corporations and government offices.
The affected stateside vendors are VMWare (Broadcom), Palo Alto Networks, and Fortinet. The ban also affects Israel-based Check Point Software. It’s not just a “remote” ban, either, as all those companies have a physical presence in China and/or Hong Kong.
