Author Topic: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.  (Read 67938 times)

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Offline mnementh

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #425 on: October 23, 2018, 11:06:00 pm »
No, what you just said is total BS. They do NOT have a "History" of this; they have a history of aggressive journalism and usually pissing off powerful people. That is NOT the same as tabloid journalism, not by a long shot.

Actually... I do believe they did publish a lemon... but I don't believe they set out to do so. I believe they found SOMETHING; still not sure what. Now whether the lemon was theirs; simply a matter of not digging deep enough, or was it a handoff from a third party to play them for fools, and why... that's the question.

I don't hold ANYTHING as impossible... I just find it much more likely, in this age of global deceit from all manner of enterprise and government agencies, that they would NOT deliberately choose this form of suicide, but were rather herded in that direction. Up to this point, I certainly trust their history of "journalistic integrity" (a relative term, for sure, especially compared to the journalism heroes of my youth) far more than ANY word that comes from our own government; ESPECIALLY this administration, "The House That Lies Built".

The notion that they deliberately went full tabloid at this late stage of the game is VERY low on my list of likely scenarios for them; there's just no payoff in it for them, only for other people.

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Offline tooki

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #426 on: October 24, 2018, 10:19:08 am »
No, what you just said is total BS. They do NOT have a "History" of this; they have a history of aggressive journalism and usually pissing off powerful people. That is NOT the same as tabloid journalism, not by a long shot.
Ummm, you can be aggressive journalism and piss off powerful people and still be writing a truthful story. (FWIW, my stepdad was a economics journalist who literally made a career of pissing off life insurance companies.)

Actually... I do believe they did publish a lemon... but I don't believe they set out to do so. I believe they found SOMETHING; still not sure what. Now whether the lemon was theirs; simply a matter of not digging deep enough, or was it a handoff from a third party to play them for fools, and why... that's the question.
Well, as an investigative journalist, your job is to find out the truth. Here, regardless of who actually created the suspected untruths, Bloomberg did not discount questionable sources. On the contrary, it appears that Bloomberg stayed the course even as they got more and more indicators that the story was wrong.

I don't hold ANYTHING as impossible... I just find it much more likely, in this age of global deceit from all manner of enterprise and government agencies, that they would NOT deliberately choose this form of suicide, but were rather herded in that direction. Up to this point, I certainly trust their history of "journalistic integrity" (a relative term, for sure, especially compared to the journalism heroes of my youth) far more than ANY word that comes from our own government; ESPECIALLY this administration, "The House That Lies Built".
Believing “ANYTHING” is possible is, well, crazy, and it must be exhausting. Some things are categorically impossible, and others are technically possible but incredibly implausible. Being able to filter out things that aren’t worth investigating is a critical skill, not a deficiency!!!!

Is this administration untrustworthy: absolutely. But that’s neither here nor there, they’re not a significant player in this incident. (However, that Apple is willing to represent to Congress (or whatever government panel it was) that the story is untrue, meaning that they’d be purjuring themselves by lying, is very telling.)

The notion that they deliberately went full tabloid at this late stage of the game is VERY low on my list of likely scenarios for them; there's just no payoff in it for them, only for other people.
Nobody said that it’s necessarily Bloomberg that invented the narrative. Please stop putting words in people’s mouths. What is indisputable is that Bloomberg published the story and has continued defending it. Whether the Bloomberg journalist invented the narrative himself, or was duped by others, is still unknown.
 

Offline borjam

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #427 on: October 24, 2018, 10:43:23 am »
Actually... I do believe they did publish a lemon... but I don't believe they set out to do so. I believe they found SOMETHING; still not sure what. Now whether the lemon was theirs; simply a matter of not digging deep enough, or was it a handoff from a third party to play them for fools, and why... that's the question.
The question is, what's that "SOMETHING"? I am pretty sure this scenario has been studied thoroughly by interested parties. Surely there have been proofs of concept.

Remember the First Gulf War? There was that news piece about some modified laser printers sold to Iraq set out to disrupt a network. It seems it turned out to be a hoax, but it was feasible at least.

http://vmyths.com/2010/11/28/wwii/

https://www.wired.com/2008/05/kill-switch-urb/

It's not hard to believe that a laser printer with a MB or two of memory (PostScript printer?) could have been manipulated to perform some trivial DoS attack inside a network. Considering the state of security in 1991...

 

Offline mnementh

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #428 on: October 24, 2018, 01:36:24 pm »
Nobody said that it’s necessarily Bloomberg that invented the narrative. Please stop putting words in people’s mouths. What is indisputable is that Bloomberg published the story and has continued defending it. Whether the Bloomberg journalist invented the narrative himself, or was duped by others, is still unknown.
YOU are the one putting words in people's mouths. You invent arguments I never made, and you post constantly about how wrong I am in those inventions.

I'm sick of your incessant nattering and demeaning tone. You STILL have yet to add anything constructive to the conversation; all your energy here of the last week has been spent tearing ME down rather than the actual subject of the thread. Get a life. It's not all about YOU.  :palm:

mnem
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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #429 on: October 24, 2018, 03:25:31 pm »
I’ve kept my gunpowder dry here as I want to nail a point home once everyone was getting all pissy.

I’ve actually been part of the bad stuff behind the scenes. I worked on contract to build systems for collecting and aggregating public opinion to see if marketing organisations had shifted it or not. Marketing organisations pay for this service to see if marketing had any real world impact.

They had no marketing customers at all. It was a front. They were all mass media trying to gauge what change their “journalism” was having. This gets fed back into the feedback cycle of “what can we write that sells an ideology” not “how can we report the facts”. In fact there were many people turfed straight into the street for not towing the line. Where does the ideology come from?

This feedback loop starts with a few opaque think tank organisations which have very disparate goals to what we might expect. Look up IEA, taxpayers alliance, Adam Smith institute etc. These are the entry points. Who backs them, we can’t see and don’t know but there are elite political ties to at least two of them. This is just the UK here to note but the same is the case world wide.

Respectable journalism ends up with demotion and occasionally dead journalists as we’ve seen from recent events in Saudi Arabia and Russia. Apart from that it’siterally shite pedalling.

What this whole thing is comes down to a rational analysis which is until there is evidence cited from multiple independent sources (not just the same one aggregated through various agencies which is a convenient way of spreading a good liee) then its horse shit as is everything that comes out of the media mouthpiece.

As far as I’m concerned this is a closed book until someone pulls up with a dead body and some analysis and then only if multiple security researchers who aren’t in the media’s pockets provide evidence to back that up.

This isn’t about feasibility either because the notion of allowing something to be considered without evidence is faith and faith turns irrationality into slavery. And that’s just so fucking wrong and makes us more stupid.

Edit: also Supermicro filed this with SEC: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1375365/000162828018012712/exhibit991_20181018.htm
« Last Edit: October 24, 2018, 03:32:05 pm by bd139 »
 
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Offline coppercone2

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #430 on: October 24, 2018, 07:00:42 pm »
this thread needs more information because IMO right now its fermenting
 
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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #431 on: October 24, 2018, 07:10:24 pm »
Is that why everyone is getting drunk and taking pot shots at each other ;)

There’s nothing to add yet. There have been SEC filings and no one has shit on the pot yet. I’m all over this so will post if anything turns up.
 
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Offline tooki

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #432 on: October 25, 2018, 03:10:08 pm »
YOU are the one putting words in people's mouths. You invent arguments I never made, and you post constantly about how wrong I am in those inventions.

I'm sick of your incessant nattering and demeaning tone. You STILL have yet to add anything constructive to the conversation; all your energy here of the last week has been spent tearing ME down rather than the actual subject of the thread. Get a life. It's not all about YOU.  :palm:

mnem
"Never argue with a fool; first they drag you down to their level, then they beat you up with experience."
Oh, by ALL means, show me where I put words in your mouth.

I’ve added plenty to the conversation, including long before you ever posted in this thread. That you don’t see those points as useful is, frankly, of little importance to me. What I refuse to bow down to is your lunatic theory that “everything” (your word!) must be considered. No. I will not concede one millimeter to your conspiracy theory nonsense.

You are correct that it’s not about me. And it never was. You’re the one trying to get everyone to agree to your bizarre, illogical views. Everyone who explains that it’s crazy, you then move the goalpost and gaslight, trying to make US out as the crazy ones. I will not stand idle as you do this.
 

Offline cdev

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #433 on: October 25, 2018, 04:05:47 pm »
Government labs should be helping solve what happened or if anything happened here.

Government helping the public and industry use technology is something they can do and do successfully, IF they do it professionally. (and in the past they have done this very well, less so now)

They should sponsor research in technologies that may pay off in the future and with complicated issues like security, they should be there to help (not hurt) US manufacturers improve security, and do it in a trustworthy, not with a hidden agenda- and the information they make public should  be reliably accurate and helpful - i.e. scientifically informed and literate, not thought-terminating -

they should publish technical reports that in an intelligent way raise the overall level of knowledge on subjects, and avoid engaging in 'drama'.

When there is a question about something like whether something has 'implants' in it the government labs with all their resources should be employed to dissect, literally, the situation and report on their findings. Thats the kind of thing we pay them to do. And they should make all that information available to the media so people can make their own decision as to what has happened.

« Last Edit: October 25, 2018, 04:11:26 pm by cdev »
"What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away."
 
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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #434 on: October 25, 2018, 04:20:49 pm »
They do already do that here: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/

NCSC offer process, hardware and software hardening guidance etc as well as general alerting, threat modelling etc.

NCSC is part of GCHQ here.
« Last Edit: October 25, 2018, 04:22:46 pm by bd139 »
 

Offline madires

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #435 on: October 27, 2018, 01:58:53 pm »
Investigating Implausible Bloomberg Supermicro Stories: https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloomberg-supermicro-stories/
 
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Offline Rick Law

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #436 on: November 01, 2018, 12:46:36 am »
Latest update from Bloomberg

Article: "Super Micro Tells Lawmakers It Found No Malicious Hardware in Its Products", Bloomberg (news), October 30 2018

In a letter emailed to Senators Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, and Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, Supermicro disputed Bloomberg reports on hacking of the company’s hardware. The letter, in response to a request for information from the senators, reiterates previous denials.

“We are confident the recent Bloomberg Businessweek stories are wrong,” wrote Perry Hayes, president of Supermicro Netherlands and Supermicro’s senior vice president of investor relations.

Hayes added: “We believe that it is impossible as a practical matter to insert unauthorized malicious chips onto our boards during the manufacturing process.”


Full article here:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-30/super-micro-says-it-found-no-malicious-hardware-in-its-products
 
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Offline David Hess

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #437 on: November 01, 2018, 12:59:05 am »
Government labs should be helping solve what happened or if anything happened here.

Government helping the public and industry use technology is something they can do and do successfully, IF they do it professionally. (and in the past they have done this very well, less so now)

They should sponsor research in technologies that may pay off in the future and with complicated issues like security, they should be there to help (not hurt) US manufacturers improve security, and do it in a trustworthy, not with a hidden agenda- and the information they make public should  be reliably accurate and helpful - i.e. scientifically informed and literate, not thought-terminating - they should publish technical reports that in an intelligent way raise the overall level of knowledge on subjects, and avoid engaging in 'drama'.

Are these the same government labs which intercept shipments to add their own backdoor hardware and firmware, pay companies like RSA to implemented backdoored encryption products, and suborn NIST into implemented flawed security standards?

The government poisoned that well starting decades ago if not sooner.
 
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Offline Halcyon

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #438 on: November 01, 2018, 02:07:48 am »
Investigating Implausible Bloomberg Supermicro Stories: https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloomberg-supermicro-stories/

Very well written and perfectly sums up what most of us suspected from the beginning: That this was at best, fake news.
 
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Offline cdev

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #439 on: November 02, 2018, 03:15:26 am »
Actually the government labs I was thinking about are different government labs. Same government, different labs.

Government labs should be helping solve what happened or if anything happened here.

Government helping the public and industry use technology is something they can do and do successfully, IF they do it professionally. (and in the past they have done this very well, less so now)

They should sponsor research in technologies that may pay off in the future and with complicated issues like security, they should be there to help (not hurt) US manufacturers improve security, and do it in a trustworthy, not with a hidden agenda- and the information they make public should  be reliably accurate and helpful - i.e. scientifically informed and literate, not thought-terminating - they should publish technical reports that in an intelligent way raise the overall level of knowledge on subjects, and avoid engaging in 'drama'.

Are these the same government labs which intercept shipments to add their own backdoor hardware and firmware, pay companies like RSA to implemented backdoored encryption products, and suborn NIST into implemented flawed security standards?

The government poisoned that well starting decades ago if not sooner.
"What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away."
 

Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #440 on: November 02, 2018, 08:47:36 am »
Lots of paranoia here. Don't forget that any national "gubment" consists of multiple branches that don't always work cohesively with each other. Also don't forget most governments are more worried about external infiltration than internal and a lot of that risk comes from the myriad of little companies that hover round the central turd like flies around shit performing technical services. It's in the government's interest to hand out decent quality guidance and security information and protect the country's interests.

Which is what ours does: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance

Now at the same time, this lot are a subsidiary of the comms spying branch too, but that doesn't mean they're giving out bad advice. Everyone is looking out for that and would call them out on their shit instantly.

If they tried to push encryption they had developed in house I might be a little suspicious but they don't.
 
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Offline David Hess

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #441 on: November 06, 2018, 09:02:44 am »
It's in the government's interest to hand out decent quality guidance and security information and protect the country's interests.

Unfortunately our NSA has abandoned securing our own infrastructure for compromising it.
 

Offline mtdoc

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #442 on: December 12, 2018, 04:15:43 am »
is australia doing what I think it did?

Yep. But to be fair all the “Five Eyes” countries are in on it. They’re just using Australia as the, ahem, backdoor to introduce the backdoors.

Discussed previously in this thread

 

Offline cdev

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #443 on: December 12, 2018, 04:35:05 am »
This all started back in 1995 when they decided they were going to privatize everything everywhere that was already partly commercial, to give investors 'certainty'..

Its moving along at a brisk pace.

That goal was inherently in conflict with democracy in a world thats automating.

But of course everything has to look as legitimate as possible.




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Offline beanflying

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #444 on: December 12, 2018, 04:51:42 am »
is australia doing what I think it did?


Yep. The idiots on the hill rammed flawed legislation to 'protect us from ABC' through on the last sitting day of parliament until February with the 'promise' to review and amend it then. Unless we go to an early election so it the becomes April maybe. All so we can remain 'safe' from unspecified possible threats XYZ in the meanwhile. :palm:

The behavior on let alone the dodgy Bill would have made the cast of Yes Minister blush in the way it was done.

Dutton isn't to be trusted



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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #445 on: December 12, 2018, 07:24:19 am »
On a positive note all this surveillance crap is self deprecating as it serves only to strengthen the infrastructure and make it more resistant to tampering. They’re digging their own graves.
 

Offline beanflying

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #446 on: December 12, 2018, 07:28:35 am »
The analogy of tight gun control doesn't stop criminals getting them will I suspect be found here too but it is the potential for abuse that still doesn't make it right. And like gun control absence of any control is a bad thing. This travesty tips the balance to far way to fast without any thought to the downsides.
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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #447 on: December 12, 2018, 07:48:10 am »
It’s a cat and mouse game as is gun control. There is no endgame, just progress. On the way we learn things.
 

Offline cdev

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #448 on: December 12, 2018, 01:47:46 pm »
One thing the British press should be warning Brits about (as far as Brexit's dangers) is your independent WTO accession (which you may need to negotiate - with hundreds of countries all having a verto power unless you make concessions to them, from scratch) and its likely impact on the NHS.

But, not a peep in your media. Am I correct?

But, it should be of major concern, because thats what the WTO's main goal is, privatizing all services unless supplied as an exercise of governmental authority, a narrow definition that almost none of them can pass. Because they do not pass the following very narrow two line test.:

Article I:3 of the 1995 GATS agreement states:
"For the purposes of this Agreement...
(b) 'services' includes any service in any sector except services supplied in the
exercise of governmental authority;
(c) 'a service supplied in the exercise of governmental authority' means any service
which is supplied neither on a commercial basis, nor in competition with one or
more service suppliers."


-------

But no discussion in the media at all. (Are people even seeing this?)

Suppression of all of the things people want, and agree upon is likely the goal of these surveillance platforms. Large scale compartmentalization of inconvenient but essential information without which democracy cannot function. Ending of the commons where people exchange opinions that may include thoughts which are not compliant with the corporate agenda to suppress the public services aspects of government and replace them with a corporate simulacra that celebrates inequality and frames the newly broken situation as one people chose when it wasn't/isn't..

A big lie.

Because of the huge job shift, there will be pressure to help the newly poor who in many cases will be people who 'did everything right'.

The positive aspects of governments - the reasons why people had joined together to create them in the first place, are being quietly ended and prevented from re-emerging by back room trade agreements. Internationally. That will be hard to hide. So the infrastructure to do that is whats being done, I suspect. (This is all speculation!)

Here in the US, and in other WTO and PTA, members, FTAs like the little known 'GATS" and pending TiSA put in place a backwards going regulatory ratchet which only allows deregulation.

Its being used to block most of the things that people want out of democracy. Because, as I have had it put to me "Otherwise people would just vote to fix everything".

We should realize that the dysfunction we see everywhere likely isn't merely failure to ever come to any agreement, in the light of this hidden agenda, one should consider the strong possibility that it may be a deliberate tactic to disenfranchise and disgust all voters

Also one aspect of the new infrastructure for surveillance is that it may be intended to become a sort of jobs or welfare program. For insiders. Except they will be placed in a difficult position vis-a-vis having opinions. So, its disenfranchising them.

 Serving an additional employment and corporate welfare and control of insiders function.

Because many of the other decent jobs because of their use of tax money in any form and lack of any national security exemption (making them potentially exempt from globalization rules, unless they are already 'committed' in an agreements "schedule" - which is based on the so called "four modes of supply" - one needs to understand that trade concept to understand these quite convoluted things!) or 'like' services are already being traded across borders.) Professions of all kinds are intended to, basically all the good jobs done by today's middle class, except those done for private companies, (which will be under downward wage pressure as well, for example in the US "Computer and Related Services" or CRS, if those sectors were committed.)

Huge sections of the economy which people are depending on to employ our young people in the future are on the bargaining table. (Or not. Depending on who you trust to be telling you the truth.)

Services, "everything you cannot drop on your foot" may well eventually, irreversibly become precarious labor done by guest workers across international borders, for very low wages, hollowing out the middle class everywhere, in rich and poor sending and receiving countries alike, replacing high skilled practitioners of professions with low paid "would-be" professionals fresh out of colleges (the Mode Four /Movement of Natural Persons provisions focus on the intra-corporate transferee, requiring they be attached to companies and have special skills, but leaving a lot unsaid, especially on wages, they may be basically paying in their less than market rate labor for the foot in the door.

...and making the millionaires who run those body shop companies billionaires off of others hard almost unpaid labor.

I'm just speculating here.

This scheme, flavors of which are seemingly being pushed in multiple trade agreements is a targeted attack on the middle class by corporations and governments, and it has the potential to bring back a sort of modern form of slavery.  So much money is involved that it could well be thought of as a sort of corrupting influence that corrupted politicians and previously honest legislators everywhere it goes.

Which is my understanding exactly what slavery did. And once it starts its very hard to get rid of.
« Last Edit: December 12, 2018, 05:24:49 pm by cdev »
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Offline bd139

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Re: Chinese manufacturer puts hardware backdoor onto Supermicro server boards.
« Reply #449 on: December 12, 2018, 02:09:26 pm »
The NHS is heavily privatised already. Most of the major organisations are shell companies / PFI / state run entirely backed with contractors, suppliers and permanent staff. There isn't really much of a public healthcare system, only the top level organisational stuff, property, data and logistics. This has mostly been a positive progression however because the rationale behind it was to make parts of the NHS accountable to someone. A government 100% can't be accountable to itself and you can't realistically sue a government as an individual. If you spin the providers off then you can separate responsibility (hospitals and trusts) and quality (NHS England) which reduces corruption and increases standards (which is actually statistically evident since this restructuring).

Now that doesn't mean that healthcare has a cost or it is a free market, but it does mean that the companies have to be transparent to the government agencies. Prior to this arrangement, quality was unknown, no one was accountable and many many lives were destroyed with no recourse.

I think people forgot the old British public sector energy, postal and transport systems and how absolutely bloody awful they were and how things have improved.

WTO has nothing to do with this either way.
« Last Edit: December 12, 2018, 02:12:49 pm by bd139 »
 


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