zh4ck

I was recently asked whether I was concerned about China adding hardware implants to commercial devices. My answer was no. But I do wish I spent the time to follow up about what is more of an issue for consumers: stuff like this. Possibly even more so: general IoT slop. It’s not exclusive to China. But China is also where most bottom cost devices come from. Whether it’s the firmware running on the hardware, or the app you install on your phone. It’s often built by copy/pasting existing work & the mfg/seller has no idea what any of it does. This is why those things are so cheap! It’s very similar to someone downloading a 3D model, clicking “print” on their 3D printer, & selling what comes out. Just a few extra steps for certain electronics. If you have a relatively secure device and you are connecting IoT slop to it, or running their apps on your device… you’re basically running random code that someone found for free or very low cost. If code was something physical that you could see & touch, people would care and value it. But it’s invisible magic so few people care.