IBM allows China to take a look at its source code

IBM has allowed China to review the source code for some of its programs, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, but the details are scarce.

According to the media report, the deal between IBM and the Chinese government is a completely new practice, which was implemented recently. It allows the Chinese government to take a closer look at the source code behind some of IBM’s software, but does not allow for the code to be copied or tampered with in any way.

It is also unknown how much time ministry officials have to look at the code.

"Strict procedures are in place within these technology demonstration centres to ensure that no software source code is released, copied or altered in any way", IBM said in a statement.

According to the report, Chinese authorities have been pressing US companies looking to expand into China to give them the source code for review, in order to confirm that there are no security risks.

According to The Register, this turn of events coincides with IBM’s recent announcement that it struck a deal with 21Vianet Group -- one of China’s data centre service providers. The deal will allow IBM to place its Bluemix cloud computing platform into China.

China has become a very important market for American companies. Aside from IBM, both Apple and Uber are fighting hard battles to gain ground in the most populated country in the world. Apple is doing a good job, with its iPhone smartphones achieving quite a notable success.

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