US Nuclear Lab Removes Chinese Tech 125
Rambo Tribble writes "Reuters reports that Los Almos National Laboratory has removed switches produced by Chinese firm H3C, which once had ties to Huawei. This appears to be a step taken to placate a nervous Congress, rather in response to any detected security issues. From the article: 'Switches are used to manage data traffic on computer networks. The exact number of Chinese-made switches installed at Los Alamos, how or when they were acquired, and whether they were placed in sensitive systems or pose any security risks, remains unclear. The laboratory - where the first atomic bomb was designed - is responsible for maintaining America's arsenal of nuclear weapons.
A spokesman for the Los Alamos lab referred inquiries to the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration, or NNSA, which declined to comment.'"
Re:What's the replacement going to be? (Score:5, Interesting)
I know of a couple alternatives from gossip with industrial controls type people. Please don't secure your nations nuclear secrets based on my /. post.
Google for "Garrett" they make industrial switches. Industrial as in weird DC voltages (for railroad, telco, etc) and supposedly good rep WRT interference protection. Like if you're running on the factory floor and the network goes bonkers when someone arc welds, rewire the run to a garrett and supposedly that'll fix it most of the time. The reputation of the prices is high, but when you need ethernet connectivity to the PLCs on a railroad engine or whatever, well...
Google for a place called "wideband" if you want a local. Low to mid end office gear. Really not that expensive, like a couple billable consultant hours for a switch or about three 3rd party wiring calls. My point is complaining about something from wideband costing $800 vs noname for $600 or Cisco for probably about $1000 is kind of pointless for a $100K/yr network admin and $50/hr electrician and all that, but for home its going to be hard to slip a $800 purchase by for a 24 port managed switch. I have no rep info on this although I've heard they work.
You need like ten centuries of switch*years before reports about reliability and such change from "anecdote" to "information" so onesie-twosie stories about "I heard of one that worked" isn't terribly useful.
Re:time to build tech in America (Score:3, Interesting)
Ok, I'll bite vim. How can we enforce the rules of those agencies on Chinese manufacturers? The bunk beds Foxconn stacked their workers in were an OSHA violation before they even started their work day.
I would recommend we sythesize your and jsepetas theories. We tax imports based on an estimated cost of the imported product if the company in question were to be OSHA, EPA, FDA, and FCC rule compliant, and as they come into compliance with each we drop that portion of the tax.
Aside from enormous difficulty of managing the import taxation-register and verifying compliance, what do you think?
Re:time to build tech in America (Score:4, Interesting)
Even if we assume for a moment that Smoot-Hawley caused the great depression (laughable given the size of imports/exports in relation to GDP) the Versailles treaty was going to shit long before it and the great depression ... France had already invaded the Ruhr 7 years earlier, initiating hyperinflation.
Re:What's the replacement going to be? (Score:5, Interesting)
The option would be to have a US company build them for 10X the cost plus the usual 1000% kickback.
I've heard the cost difference between Chinese vs. American manufacturing is about 15% for an iPhone (or presumably something like it). Don't have a good source for that, though.