China :: Exposé

Sounds like there is a bootlegged version of  every damn thing in China. The word "fake" is nothing new in China. President Trump is behind time when it comes to "fake news". China has been faking everything including new since time immemorial ... The Fake Walmart China busts 50 factories making fake branded seasoning with ‘dangerous’ ingredients in latest food scandal A "production hub" which churned out counterfeit  seasoning designed to look like well known brands such as Nestle and Knorr is being investigated in China, in what appears to be the latest food scandal to spark anger in the country. Around 50 factories used what media called “dangerous” ingredients, including industrial salt and artificial colouring and food additives, at the manufacturing base which was reported to have existed for more than 10 years. Officials in  the northern port city of Tianjin, where the elaborate operation was located, have been instructed to ...

Suspects in China’s ‘biggest baby milk scandal in decade’ go on trial Group accused of passing off cheaper baby milk formula as well-known brand names A group of 12 people accused of making and selling fake branded baby milk powder in what could be the biggest milk formula scandal in a decade in China went on trial in Shanghai on Monday. The case was first brought to light by the government’s food safety watchdog after complaints by the US- baby milk powder producer Abbott, which was a victim of the fakes. The case comes after the outcry in 2008 when at least six children died after some producers for the Sanlu Group were found to have added melamine to their products to make it look like watered-down milk was high in protein. 19 arrested for selling hundreds of tonnes of expired milk powder in China The scandal shattered Chinese public confidence in domestic milk powder products and drove them to look for imported alternatives, including buying up supplie...

In 2011, the US Government submitted 1,745 applications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for authorization to conduct electronic surveillance or physical searches under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), according to a new annual report to Congress. Of these, 1,676 included requests for authority for perform electronic surveillance, the report said. That compares to 1,579 such applications in 2010 (including 1,511 for electronic surveillance). As is usually the case, the FIS Court did not deny any electronic surveillance applications in whole or in part last year, though it made modifications to 30 of them. The new report says that the government filed 205 applications for business records (including tangible things) for foreign intelligence purposes last year, compared to 96 in the previous year. But the number of national security letters (a type of administrative subpoena) declined last year. In 2011, the FBI requested 16,511 national security lette...

More than a thousand boxes of classified government records are believed to be missing from the Washington National Records Center (WNRC) of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), a three-year Inspector General investigation found . But there are no indications of theft or espionage, an official said. An inventory of the holdings at the Records Center determined that 81 boxes containing Top Secret information or Restricted Data (nuclear weapons information) were missing. As of March 2011, an additional 1,540 boxes of material classified at the Secret or Confidential level also could not be located or accounted for, the Inspector General report on the matter said. Each box can hold approximately 1.1 cubic feet or 2000 to 2500 sheets of paper. The missing records represent an ongoing failure at WNRC to protect some of the most sensitive information produced by the Federal Government, wrote NARA Inspector General Paul Brachfeld in a 2009 letter to the Acting Archivist....

Sunday, April 29 marked the 44th anniversary of the death of Lin Zhao, a talented Peking University student who was secretly executed for speaking out against the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the notorious Hundred Flowers Movement of 1957 launched by Mao Zedong. More than 100 people paid homage to her tomb without encountering interference, and the many memorials commemorating her on the Internet have not been censored. The usual Baidu search engine ban was lifted and even searching, Lin Zhaos letter in blood could be accessed. On Sina Weibo, Chinas largest microblog, the well-known blogger Han Han posted, On April 29, 1968, Lin Zhao was secretly shot to death. Most of my young friends do not even know her name. Life is short but freedom is priceless. History has exonerated her, but history has received her 5-cent bullet fee. Let the bullet fly on. The message was forwarded more than 30,000 times. Hong Kong author Wu Yisan said in an interview with Radio Free Asia that...

The U.S. electric power grid is vulnerable to damage from severe electromagnetic solar storms and remedial measures should be taken to reduce that vulnerability, a new study (large pdf) from the JASON scientific advisory panel concluded. On the other hand, the JASONs said, catastrophic worst-case scenarios advanced by some are not plausible, and they should not serve as a basis for policy making. Public disclosure of the new JASON study was blocked by the Department of Homeland Security, which sponsored the analysis. But a copy was obtained by Secrecy News. Concerns about the vulnerabilities of technical infrastructure to space weather have been growing since the sun entered the early stages of the current sunspot cycle in 2009, increasing prospects for severe solar storms, the report said. We agree that the U.S. electric grid remains vulnerable, the JASONs concluded . Mitigation should be undertaken as soon as possible to reduce the vulnerability of the U.S. grid. The cost appears m...

Sun Guangwen, a retired professor from Shandong University, ran for Peoples Congress deputy at Lichen District in Jinan City, Shandong Province. On Dec. 12, police prevented him from voting, and on Dec. 9, Shandong University authorities confiscated his home of 26 years. (Courtesy of Prof. Sun) Although the Chinese regimes crackdown on independent candidates for the Peoples Congress has escalated, the surge in independent candidates demonstrates Chinas budding democracy consciousness. 2011 has been an election year for deputy positions in the Peoples Congress at district, township, and county levels in China. The surge of independent grassroots candidates, many of whom have promoted themselves via microblogs, has garnered much domestic and international attention. However, the regime has been suppressing these independent candidates like never before. He Huahui, Deputy Secretary of the National Peoples Congress (NPC) Standing Committee told Chinese media, this year 900 million c...