In today’s highly digitalized era, the importance of cybersecurity is becoming increasingly prominent—it not only concerns personal privacy and corporate secrets, but can even impact national security. What is particularly alarming is that certain maliciously embedded or intentionally designed backdoors may become the fuse for information leakage, the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) warned on Monday.
A "technical backdoor" typically refers to a method that bypasses normal security mechanisms to gain access to a program or system. While originally intended to help developers debug or fix vulnerabilities, if not removed in time, such backdoors can be exploited by malicious attackers, becoming major security threats. These backdoors can allow unauthorized access to systems and provide access to sensitive data, the MSS said.
Some foreign-made chips, smart devices, or software may be deliberately implanted with backdoors during the design or manufacturing stages. Through specific signals, the manufacturers could remotely control these devices ─ such as automatically activating cameras or microphones, or instructing the system to collect and transmit designated data, the MSS noted.
In some cases, manufacturers may preset remote access backdoors in products to facilitate post-sale maintenance. While intended as a service function, if poorly managed or cracked by third parties, such backdoors can become hidden vulnerabilities, spying and stealing sensitive data, the MSS warned.
In addition, some malicious manufacturers may exploit software update channels, tamper with open-source code repositories, or alter code in the supply chain to plant backdoors during device usage, achieving illegal control or secret theft.
The security of smart devices and information systems is closely tied to each and every one of us ─ and even more so to national security. Key confidential positions should consider adopting independently developed chips and domestic operating systems to avoid risks from foreign hardware or software backdoors, according to the MSS.
原文地址：http://en.people.cn/n3/2025/0721/c90000-20342922.html