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China is doing everything it can to make a name for itself in the world of technology. That includes hacking into big tech firms by means of friendly competitions in which people participate and report their findings to the government.
Hackathons are common, but Chinese hacking competitions are different. China has been dominating popular international cybersecurity competitions like Pwn2Own. However, more recently, the country has developed its own hacking contests, essentially withdrawing from international events.
In 2017, Zhou Hongyi, the founder of Chinese cybersecurity giant Qihoo 360, publicly criticised the practice of sharing vulnerability discoveries internationally, arguing that such strategic assets should stay within China. His sentiments, supported by the Chinese government, gave birth to the national hacking competition called the Tianfu Cup. The contest is focused on discovering vulnerabilities in global tech products like Apple iOS, Google’s Android, and Microsoft systems.
How is Tianfu Cup different?
According to a report by Bloomberg, a 2018 rule mandates participants of the Tianfu Cup to hand over their findings to the government, instead of the tech companies.
Dakota Cary, a China-focused consultant at the US cybersecurity company SentinelOne, said, “In practice, this meant vulnerabilities were passed to the state for use in operations.”
This approach effectively turned hacking competitions into a government pipeline for acquiring zero-day vulnerabilities — software flaws unknown to vendors and extremely valuable for cyber-espionage.
US steps into the picture
This practice of acquiring sensitive data from big tech companies has brewed trouble for China in the past.
Recently, a data leak involving files from the Chinese cybersecurity firm i-Soon, posted on GitHub, revealed apparent connections between hacking competitions, the government, and the cyber firms granted access to discovered vulnerabilities.
Several i-Soon employees were charged by US authorities in March, who alleged that they were carrying out cyberattacks at the direction of the Chinese government.
In recent years, China’s hacking competitions have increasingly shifted focus toward breaching domestic products, including Chinese-made electric vehicles, phones, and security software. This aligns closely with Beijing’s broader “Delete America” initiative, aimed at replacing foreign technology with homegrown alternatives and achieving greater self-reliance.
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