Australian Govco now banning DJI drones

[Zbip57]

Here's a fascinating video detailing what sort of flying surveillance equipment is actually being used by NATO.

 

[Zbip57]

It's got an RF receiver/transmitter and a general-purpose CPU with firmware. That's all you need.
I don't need to prove anything, I'm not the one pushing for a ban. I'm just telling you what the fears are. If calling them unjustified is all it took to assuage them, then America wouldn't have such a huge political chasm right now.

It's all about fear. Fear can convince people to believe all sorts of utter nonsense, no matter how ridiculous. Here's Mike Lindell's crackpot idea of how to prevent election fraud.

Wi-Fi sniffers strapped to drones—Mike Lindell’s odd plan to stop election fraud

Lindell wants to fly drones near polling places to monitor voting machines.

arstechnica.com

Here's the video. It goes on for hours and hours, but jump to 4:37:38 where he introduces his ("first time in history") magic device strapped to a drone to detect Wifi connections. Lindell said the gadget, which he calls a "WMD" for "Wireless Monitoring Device," detects nearby Wi-Fi networks and MAC addresses.

 

[Chip]

Maybe if western countries are so worried about Chinese drones they should make it a priority to make drones in the west for security reasons.

Yes, I agree.

It's very much the same thing driving the ban on DJI drones. Someone doesn't like China flooding the US market, creating a near-monopoly on drone sales, so they accuse them of spying. Say it often enough and people start believing it. When asked for technical information on how that might be done, or what sort of information is even possible to be collected this way, well that's "classified".

Okay, so are you acknowledging that China has in fact flooded the US market creating a near monopoly on drone sales? If so, do you believe that poses any threat at all to US interests or security?

 

[Zbip57]

Okay, so are you acknowledging that China has in fact flooded the US market creating a near monopoly on drone sales?

I wouldn't phrase it like that. You make it sound like communist China set out with a fiendishly clever plot designed to "flood" the US market with drones.

Instead, DJI manufactures a superior product at affordable prices to fill a burgeoning worldwide consumer demand. Other non-Chinese consumer drone companies do exist, but their products are either too expensive and/or lack the features and reliability of DJI drones.

If so, do you believe that poses any threat at all to US interests or security?

The USA, like most other countries, is interested in conducting prosperous trading practices, manufacturing and exporting products to the rest of the world to create a positive money flow back into the USA. Unfortunately the USA currently suffers the largest trading deficit of any other country in the world. It exports far less product than it imports.

And, of all the other countries the USA trades with, China represents by far the largest deficit in trading partners. Fully 65% of the USA's worldwide trade deficit is due to imports from China, with insufficient exports going the opposite way from the USA to China.
See: worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/us-trade-deficit-by-country
"The main imports that the US purchased from China include clothing, machinery, and electronics."

Every time an American spends $US buying Chinese electronics, it contributes another drop in the bucket to that trade deficit. So yes, in that sense, every purchase of a DJI drone represents an economic threat to US interests.

[...] do you believe that poses any threat at all to US interests or security?

In an economic sense, if the USA ever were to default on paying its international debts, that could eventually result in issues with the nation's security. But do I believe DJI consumer drones present a threat of espionage? Nope. I won't believe that until someone provides proof of how that's actually happening. Meanwhile, legislation to ban police and fire departments and other useful US government departmental use of DJI drones is pretty much ridiculous.

 

[Chip]

I wouldn't phrase it like that. You make it sound like communist China set out with a fiendishly clever plot designed to "flood" the US market with drones.

I actually framed my question using your words:

It's very much the same thing driving the ban on DJI drones. Someone doesn't like China flooding the US market, creating a near-monopoly on drone sales, so they accuse them of spying. Say it often enough and people start believing it.

Maybe I misunderstood but I thought your point was that because people are unhappy with China "flooding" the US market, they are fabricating allegations of spying.

Are you not then acknowledging "flooding" of the market? As I understand it, flooding the market is a trade tactic designed to seize control of a market. Is that not what you meant?

 

[WanderLost]

DJI published a white paper a couple of years ago outlining the increasing risk of hacking/spying with drones. Since they have come such a long way in capabilities, governments have begun to be worried about the integrity of their data.
Some of the interesting things, besides heavy duty encryption from end to end, is the ability to shut off uploading and logging and being able to fly without connection to DJI servers.
It goes beyond US gov. issues and into battle ground hacking of surveillance drones that can be mitigated with a number of proper computer lockdowns and ROM only bootup memory.
Even updates can't be uploaded without certification/verification and control from a network administrator in government and enterprise drones.
Many of the R&D mentioned in the paper has made it's way into their higher end drones. There were 2 Enterprise drones that were actually certified for use by US government agencies.

 

[Zbip57]

Maybe I misunderstood but I thought your point was that because people are unhappy with China "flooding" the US market, they are fabricating allegations of spying.

Are you not then acknowledging "flooding" of the market? As I understand it, flooding the market is a trade tactic designed to seize control of a market. Is that not what you meant?

I shouldn't have used the term "flooding".

That has connotations of illegality. That implies they're selling a product for less money than it actually costs to produce. Nobody can possibly compete at that artificially low price level, so they eventually gain total control of the market, after which they can raise prices to a realistic level to recover their losses.

Labour is cheaper in China than in the USA, which certainly is a contributing factor to trade imbalances. But there's no denying that DJI is a successful worldwide company based on merit. They just produce better drones.

All that said, the drone market represents only a mere fraction of the trade imbalance with China. Even if the USA could close its borders entirely to drone imports from China, that's not going to make any noticeable difference to the huge debt already owed. The USA pays something like $95 million daily to China merely to service the interest owed on their current $850 billion debt.

Here's an interesting article worth reading:
thehill.com/opinion/international/4075341-china-is-in-default-on-a-trillion-dollars-in-debt-to-us-bondholders-will-the-us-force-repayment/

Even if that were possible, (forcing China to repay a trillion dollar debt outstanding from 1938), it doesn't solve the root problem. The US imports more goods from China compared to what it exports to China. Rather than effectively dealing with that, let's just paint China as the next evil empire and feed the flames of paranoia and suspicion by convincing your population that all Chinese products are spying on you...

It's like the "war on drugs". Let's invade other countries to make them stop producing opium, heroin, cocaine, and whatever else. Let's "build a wall" to keep that stuff out. All while failing to address the much bigger problem and question of why America has such an enormous appetite and marketplace for mind-altering drugs.

 

[shb]

I shouldn't have used the term "flooding".

That has connotations of illegality. That implies they're selling a product for less money than it actually costs to produce. Nobody can possibly compete at that artificially low price level, so they eventually gain total control of the market, after which they can raise prices to a realistic level to recover their losses.

Labour is cheaper in China than in the USA, which certainly is a contributing factor to trade imbalances. But there's no denying that DJI is a successful worldwide company based on merit. They just produce better drones.

All that said, the drone market represents only a mere fraction of the trade imbalance with China. Even if the USA could close its borders entirely to drone imports from China, that's not going to make any noticeable difference to the huge debt already owed. The USA pays something like $95 million daily to China merely to service the interest owed on their current $850 billion debt.

Here's an interesting article worth reading:
thehill.com/opinion/international/4075341-china-is-in-default-on-a-trillion-dollars-in-debt-to-us-bondholders-will-the-us-force-repayment/

Even if that were possible, (forcing China to repay a trillion dollar debt outstanding from 1938), it doesn't solve the root problem. The US imports more goods from China compared to what it exports to China. Rather than effectively dealing with that, let's just paint China as the next evil empire and feed the flames of paranoia and suspicion by convincing your population that all Chinese products are spying on you...

It's like the "war on drugs". Let's invade other countries to make them stop producing opium, heroin, cocaine, and whatever else. Let's "build a wall" to keep that stuff out. All while failing to address the much bigger problem and question of why America has such an enormous appetite and marketplace for mind-altering drugs.

Glad you never went off topic, like I did on the homeless thread.

 

[Zbip57]

Glad you never went off topic, like I did on the homeless thread.

True that, considering this thread is supposed to be about Australia.

 

[EssenYVR]

Speaking of banning foreign-built products due to national security concerns...

Tesla cars banned from China's military complexes on security concerns
Tesla is still battling spying suspicions in China

 

[Chip]

Speaking of banning foreign-built products due to national security concerns...

Tesla cars banned from China's military complexes on security concerns
Tesla is still battling spying suspicions in China

What? Oh my the irony. Under the circumstances, I demand that China justify its ban and prove to my satisfaction that Tesla cars are "spying" for Elon or the USA. If China fails to do so, then it proves they just can't build their own electric car as good as Elon and they just can't handle a little competition. I wonder if we will see many Tesla owners complaining on social media in China about their government's stupid and phony ban on Teslas?

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Speaking of banning foreign-built products due to national security concerns...

Tesla cars banned from China's military complexes on security concerns
Tesla is still battling spying suspicions in China

And they build the 3's Y's right there in the new gigafactory

Tit for tat is a common way certain countries deal with things.

Australia has certainly experienced this in recent years, and possibly with this DJI GOVCO policy, we'll be mucked about again with our exports.

 

[Meta4]

possibly with this DJI GOVCO policy, we'll be mucked about again with our exports.

There is no government policy.
It's just an attention-seeking opposition senator grandstanding about DJI drones.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

There is no government policy.
It's just an attention-seeking opposition senator grandstanding about DJI drones.

Yes just discovering / copying the US on this, but you and I should know you only have to offend certain entities verbally, even mildly, to get them all offended and reactive.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

What? Oh my the irony. Under the circumstances, I demand that China justify its ban and prove to my satisfaction that Tesla cars are "spying" for Elon or the USA. If China fails to do so, then it proves they just can't build their own electric car as good as Elon and they just can't handle a little competition. I wonder if we will see many Tesla owners complaining on social media in China about their government's stupid and phony ban on Teslas?

Vidoes now popping up on Youtube, folk that have lived in China for long periods and know the place well, contacts etc.

This guy reports on how crazy things are there at times, both humorous and draconian.
He was driven out eventually along with many foreigners.

 

[Zbip57]

This guy reports on how crazy things are there at times, both humorous and draconian.
He was driven out eventually along with many foreigners.

A friend of friend who lives in Hong Kong sent this:

The guy doing that video is now paid to do negative videos about China. Many years ago, he lived in China, and did some interesting video blogs about life in China. I used to watch them, and got much useful information from him. Then something happened, and he was forced to leave China, and apparently got a contract to do negative videos about China. Now almost of his videos distort the truth, to make China look bad. With respect to China banning Teslas in general, that's not true, there are thousands on the road in Hong Kong, and I saw lots on the road in Shenzhen, when I was there last week. I just did a search, and there were some places that restricted Teslas from sensitive areas (just as the USA does), and one city that temporarily banned them due to accidents caused by the self-driving mode. There are probably some other incidents around the country, but they would be local issues.

 

[EssenYVR]

The guy doing that video is now paid to do negative videos about China. ... Now almost of his videos distort the truth, to make China look bad.

He's getting paid like all the other YouTube content providers are getting paid. If there are any factual errors in what he's reporting then your friend of a friend should just point them out.

And, alas, it takes very little (if any) distortion of the truth to make the Chinese Communist Party look bad.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

A friend of friend who lives in Hong Kong sent this:

The guy doing that video is now paid to do negative videos about China. Many years ago, he lived in China, and did some interesting video blogs about life in China. I used to watch them, and got much useful information from him. Then something happened, and he was forced to leave China, and apparently got a contract to do negative videos about China. Now almost of his videos distort the truth, to make China look bad. With respect to China banning Teslas in general, that's not true, there are thousands on the road in Hong Kong, and I saw lots on the road in Shenzhen, when I was there last week. I just did a search, and there were some places that restricted Teslas from sensitive areas (just as the USA does), and one city that temporarily banned them due to accidents caused by the self-driving mode. There are probably some other incidents around the country, but they would be local issues.

Thanks for the info.
One never knows I guess.
If your friend isn’t under any sort of pro ccp influence, then it’s quite possible there is some sort of political influence with anything you find online.
Of course many of these channels sometimes click bait for views, likes etc too.
I guess people need to watch and get a feel for someone’s contact, watch multiple channels for reports of similar story baselines, and make up their own minds regarding how authentic the content on these channels might be.

 

[Zbip57]

I guess people need to [...] make up their own minds [...]

Much like they need to make up their own minds whether DJI drones are an actual security risk to their own country.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Much like they need to make up their own minds whether DJI drones are an actual security risk to their own country.

True, we know it is most likely an over reaction and hurts almost all GOVCO depts there, but politics is a powerful influencer.