Chinese Military Likely To Get Custom OS As Substitute For Windows

Chinese military officials are likely to get a new custom operating system (OS) as a substitute for Windows OS to guard them against espionage and cyber attacks, particularly by the US.

“Chinese military officials would not jump from Windows to Linux but instead develop a custom OS,” ZDNet reported Tuesday, citing a report published by Canada’s Kanwa Asian Defence military magazine.

The country has come to a decision after it feared cyber attacks following Edward Snowden, Shadow Brokers and Vault7 leak cases. Smart Tvs, Linux servers, routers, common desktop operating systems such as Windows and Mac, anything could be affected.

The Chinese government plans to adopt a "security by obscurity" approach and run a custom OS that would make it harder for foreign threats -- mainly the US -- to spy on Chinese military operations, the report said.

The task of developing the new OS would fall to a new "Internet Security Information Leadership Group" that would answer directly to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the report said.

North Korea also has a custom OS for use inside the country, called "Red Star" OS, which is still alive. The Red Star never became the “official” OS for government agencies, that continued to use Windows, Mac and Linux in addition to it.

China's decision comes after US President Donald Trump decided to scrutinize trade relations between the two countries due to security concerns. On May 15, Trump effectively banned Chinese tech major Huawei with a national security order following which Qualcomm, along with Google, Microsoft, Intel and ARM, put restrictions on businesses with Huawei.