From the Wall Street Journal:

A debate is brewing in the U.S. government over whether to publicly warn businesspeople and other travelers heading to the Beijing Olympics about the dangers posed by Chinese computer hackers.

According to government officials and security consultants, U.S. intelligence agencies are worried about the potential threat to U.S. laptops and cellphones. But others, including the State and Commerce departments and some companies, are trying to quiet the issue for fear of offending the Chinese, these people say.

In addition to cybersecurity threats in other countries, "so many people are going to the Olympics and are going to get electronically undressed," said Joel Brenner, the government's top counterintelligence officer. He tells of one computer-security expert who powered up a new Treo hand-held computer when his plane landed in China. By the time he got to his hotel, a handful of software programs had been wirelessly inserted.

There have been some recent examples of possible espionage coupled with really stupid actions by foreign diplomats. We had U.S. officials this summer coming over here and carelessly leaving laptops unattended. I read yesterday about a British official who got caught in a "honeytrap" (i.e. couldn't keep his trousers zipped) and compromised security. These guys almost deserve getting their stuff stolen.

And then there are all those stories about Chinese hackers and the assault the PLA is making on government sites around the world. The stories never seem to make any distinction between hacker gangs of 14-year-olds and actual government agents, of course, but we'll let that slide for the moment.

Now we have a possible warning given to travelers to the Olympics. Right. If you come over here with your laptop, most likely full of MP3s and porn, be careful because the Chinese might copy your data. Look, I can understand some good old fashioned espionage against some high-level government types, but "businesspeople and other travelers"? I really doubt that the government here has the resources to mount that sort of spying campaign, but paranoia sure is fun.

By the way, that guy quoted above who tells the story of a computer-security expert who had apps downloaded onto his Treo automatically? It's hard to tell from the quote whether this was some sort of security test or whether this guy is just a really shitty computer security expert. As a U.S. taxpayer, I'm kind of hoping for the former, but you never know.