An international dispute over a wireless computing standard took a bitter turn this past week with the Chinese delegation walking out of a global meeting to discuss the technology.
The delegation's walkout from Wednesday's opening of a two-day meeting in the Czech Republic escalated an already rancorous struggle by China to gain international acceptance for its homegrown encryption technology known as WAPI. It follows Chinese accusations that a US-based standards body used underhanded tactics to prevent global approval of WAPI.
"In this extremely unfair atmosphere, it is meaningless for the Chinese delegation to continue attending the meeting," the Standardization Administration of China delegation said in a statement carried by the official Xinhua News Agency.
The US-based group, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, denies any impropriety and says China isn't playing by the established rules.
At stake is a leg-up in technology research and billions of dollars in licensing fees and component sales for laptops, mobile phones, handheld computers and other wireless devices that connect to wireless networks around the world, including hotels, coffee shops and universities.
These gadgets run on networks based on the IEEE's 802.11 standards. The original standards, however, have security holes that allow digital snoops to steal data from those who are logged on to the networks.
Members of the IEEE, an open international professional organization, and a Chinese government-backed group of engineers with military backgrounds, have developed competing technologies to plug the security holes: for China, WAPI, for the IEEE, 802.11i.
China had earlier tried to compel Intel and other tech companies to adopt its WAPI standard domestically, leading to a showdown with Washington that ended with Beijing backing down last year.
But the push for the Chinese standard persisted and Beijing decided to follow Washington's advice and put the Chinese standard before the International Organization for Standardization, or ISO, a world body made up of representatives from national standardization groups.
In March, delegates representing standard bodies from 25 countries voted in favor of the IEEE's version over WAPI.
China appealed the ISO decision and demanded an apology from the IEEE which it accused of "dirty tricks" in lobbying for its standard, Xinhua said.
The Standardization Administration of China, in a statement, accused backers of the US technology of "a lot of dirty tricks including deception, misinformation, confusion and reckless charging to lobby against WAPI," Xinhua reported.
The ISO organized the Czech Republic meeting as a follow-up. ISO spokesman Roger Frost on Thursday refused to comment on the Chinese delegation's walkout.
The IEEE has called on China to return to the talks and offered to work with the country on harmonizing the WAPI technology with international standards.
Steve Mills, the chairman of the IEEE Standards Association Standards Board, said in a statement, China "has lost another valuable opportunity to constructively discuss the technical merits of the two security amendments."
The Eurovision Song Contest has seen a surge in punter interest at the bookmakers, becoming a major betting event, experts said ahead of last night’s giant glamfest in Basel. “Eurovision has quietly become one of the biggest betting events of the year,” said Tomi Huttunen, senior manager of the Online Computer Finland (OCS) betting and casino platform. Betting sites have long been used to gauge which way voters might be leaning ahead of the world’s biggest televised live music event. However, bookmakers highlight a huge increase in engagement in recent years — and this year in particular. “We’ve already passed 2023’s total activity and
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) today announced that his company has selected "Beitou Shilin" in Taipei for its new Taiwan office, called Nvidia Constellation, putting an end to months of speculation. Industry sources have said that the tech giant has been eyeing the Beitou Shilin Science Park as the site of its new overseas headquarters, and speculated that the new headquarters would be built on two plots of land designated as "T17" and "T18," which span 3.89 hectares in the park. "I think it's time for us to reveal one of the largest products we've ever built," Huang said near the
BIG BUCKS: Chairman Wei is expected to receive NT$34.12 million on a proposed NT$5 cash dividend plan, while the National Development Fund would get NT$8.27 billion Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday announced that its board of directors approved US$15.25 billion in capital appropriations for long-term expansion to meet growing demand. The funds are to be used for installing advanced technology and packaging capacity, expanding mature and specialty technology, and constructing fabs with facility systems, TSMC said in a statement. The board also approved a proposal to distribute a NT$5 cash dividend per share, based on first-quarter earnings per share of NT$13.94, it said. That surpasses the NT$4.50 dividend for the fourth quarter of last year. TSMC has said that while it is eager
China yesterday announced anti-dumping duties as high as 74.9 percent on imports of polyoxymethylene (POM) copolymers, a type of engineering plastic, from Taiwan, the US, the EU and Japan. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s findings conclude a probe launched in May last year, shortly after the US sharply increased tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, computer chips and other imports. POM copolymers can partially replace metals such as copper and zinc, and have various applications, including in auto parts, electronics and medical equipment, the Chinese ministry has said. In January, it said initial investigations had determined that dumping was taking place, and implemented preliminary
RSS