Information/Technology - 101. page

On May 2, 2008, the opening ceremony of the first Confucius Institute of the National University of Mongolia was held in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

According to the statistics by the office of Chinese Language Council International, as of March 2008, 238 Confucius Institutes have opened in 69 countries and regions. The number has nearly doubled in two years from 2006 when 120 Confucius Institutes were established in 50 countries and regions.

Source:
Xinhua, May 2, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-05/02/content_8092008.htm
The office of Chinese Language Council International http://www.hanban.org/cn_hanban/content.php?id=3258

China UniCom announced today that it would introduce a “Firewall” service for its Cellular Messaging users throughout China to combat the problem of “junk” messages. Through technological innovation, this automatic service allows incoming messages to be filtered based on pre-selected key words, according to one senior engineer of the state-owned company. The company also announced a platform for users to report “unhealthy” messages that can be analyzed and reported to the authorities automatically. According to China’s Internet Association for Anti-Junk Mails Working Committee, cellular phone users in China have received a total of 353.9 billions junk messages in 2007, a 92.7% increase from 2006.

Source: Xinhua, April 29, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-04/29/content_8075377.htm

China Youth Online conducted a survey on measures to take in reviving morale at colleges. The survey results suggested the following:

71.3 percent – emphasize education on a human plane; encourage students to “challenge and question” and form individual personalities;
64.9 percent – need the whole society to respect education and creativity rather than merely promoting wealth and power;
55.3 percent – improve teachers’ skills and ability; standardize teachers’ skill training;
53.5 percent – apart from academics, college teachers need to pursue moral values and self-restraint;
51.3 percent – improve transparency to allow colleges to have more flexibility to grow;
37.6 percent – encourage more college professors to get involved in school management.

Source: China Youth Online, April 28, 2008
http://zqb.cyol.com/content/2008-04/28/content_2160626.htm

The Ninth China Information Security Conference took place on April 22, 2008, hosted by the China Center for Information Industry Development (CCIID) [1] and China lnfoworld. According to a Xinhua report, it was also “supported and guided” by the Professional Committee of Computer Security of China Computer Federation [2], the Institute of National Security Technology [3], the Information Security Research and Service Center under State Information Center [4], the National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team/Coordination Center [5], and the China Information Technology Security Certification Center. Liu Liehong, dean of CCIID, said that the goal of the national information industry is to “establish a credible environment and order for the Internet world.” Yan Ming, ex-director of the First Research Institute under the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), pointed out that securing information related to national security is facing outstanding challenges and increasing opportunities.

Source: Xinhua, April 24, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/it/2008-04/24/content_8043564.htm

Footnotes:
[1] An agency under Ministry of Information Industry (MII)
[2] An agency affiliated with the Eleventh Bureau of Ministry of Public Security
[3] The only research institute under Security Committee of CCCCP (Central Committee of Chinese Communist Party) and National Security Bureau (NSB)
[4] An agency under National Development and Reform Commission
[5] An agency under MII

With the spread of 3G technology, China’s wireless video surveillance technology is migrating to a new Internet communication standard from traditional CDMA technology. At the China Police Expo 2008 in Beijing, various new surveillance products were on display. According to a Xinhua news report, the boom of this industry was because of the government’s strategy of creating a “harmonious society” and the Olympics Security Operations. Exhibitors at the Expo included companies based in China, Italy, U.K., Germany, Singapore, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Czech, New Zealand, U.S., Russia, and France.

Source: Xinhua, April 17, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-04/17/content_7992541.htm

China Administration of Radio, Film and TV (SARFT) now has a nationwide TV program monitoring network that allows government to monitor real time TV broadcasting of 1,372 programs. The capability is deemed one of the latest achievements of research and development of the SARFT. "This has totally changed the ineffective way of the past when we had to manually monitor – we could not listen or watch or follow up or track down or discipline.”

Source:
Xinhua, April 9, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2008-04/09/content_7949230.htm

PLA Daily claimed that China is the biggest target of spyware which mostly are from US. In a recent Annual Report of China Internet Security Report, the statistics claimed that there were 64,000 computers attacked by spyware worldwide daily and 26 percent of them took place in China. According to National Computer network Emergency Response Technical Team (CNCERT/CC), there were 220,000 spyware attacks to China from overseas in 2005 where 40 percent were from US, 11 percent from Japan, 10 percent form Taiwan, and 8 percent from Karea.

Source: Xinhua, April 3, 2008
http://news.xinhuanet.com/mil/2008-04/03/content_7909500.htm

On March 6, PetroChina announced the opening of a commercial oil reserve project in Shanshan county of Xinjiang province. Total oil reserves there are expected to reach 1 million cubic meters. The project marks the beginning of China’s second phase of tapping oil reserves in response to the worldwide oil shortage.

The first phase centers on the coastline and consists of four strategic oil reserve bases: Zhanhai, Zhejiang province; Huangdao, Shandong province; Zhoushan, Zhejiang province and Dalian, Liaoning province. The Dalian base was the last one opened and it was close to being 2/3 completed as of March 6.

Source: China Stock, March 7, 2008 http://cnstock.xinhuanet.com/newcjzh/06cjdt/2008-03/07/content_3075200.htm