China To Develop Secure, US Surveillance-Proof Smartphone

China is planning for its own, secure smartphone that will be insulated from the spying eyes of the NSA, CIA and other American agencies. The WSJ reports that Chinese government is pulling in state owned companies and a couple of known Chinese smartphone handset brands to develop the phone; with an aim to cut the US suppliers.

The report further adds that the Chinese authorities aren't very happy about the US dominance in the smartphone OS and processors domain as these are the most vulnerable part of the phones, prone to hacking. In China, most of the phones are either made by Apple or run on Google's Android operating system; both American corporations.

The lagging technology was one of the prime reasons for China's reliance on American smartphones. Last year, Peng Liyuan, the first lady of China switched to ZTE Nubia Z5 - a smartphone made by Chinese company. However the phone ran on Android and used a Qualcomm processor; which again is an American semiconductor company.



With the advancement in technology, Chinese tech giants are making moves towards independent smartphone manufacturing and the effort is being encouraged by the government officials. Back in 2013, Edward Snowden had revealed that NSA had sneaked surveillance software in some of the American gadgets sold overseas.

ZTE Corporation, a Chinese smartphone giant has began work on developing a smartphone that uses Chinese operating system and the processors are being procured from another Chinese supplier. A major step towards a 100% Chinese smartphone somes from Spreadtrum Communications Inc. which has promised to mass produce processor chips compatible with the Chinese operating system. Alibaba Group has already showed its own support to this initiative by planning to develop a mobile OS for the Chinese police officers. Read: China operating system to end Android & iOS dominance

WSJ reports that the Chinese secure phone manufactured by ZTE is unlikely to impress the average Chinese consumer - as the phone will cut down on cameras, GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth to minimize the security risk.

India too has made an attempt at developing its own operating system, but it derives its core from Linux: BOSS Operating System from CDAC! and has already made lot of progress towards building its own GPS alternative called IRNSS: ISRO's IRNSS - The Desi Navigation System To Replace American GPS

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Source: China Aims to Build Its Own Secure Smartphones - WSJ