微软推出中国版Windows，称可供政府部门使用

微软上周二表示，新的中国政府版Windows 10已经可供中国政府部门使用。

中国海关、上海市政府以及隶属于央企中国科技电子集团的信息安全公司卫士通已成为微软这款新产品的首批用户。微软发言人称，这是该公司首次为中国客户推出定制Windows。

微软的中国定制版Windows凸显出在华经营的美国科技公司面临的难题。举例来说，即将出炉的中国《网络安全法》要求外国科技公司向政府巡视人员提供产品源代码。源代码通常为软件厂商专有，而中国政府表示有必要查看源代码，以便检验是否存在可能被黑客利用的漏洞。《华尔街日报》报道，微软、IBM和英特尔去年12月曾对此表示不满。

微软当时指出：“共享源代码本身并不能证明软件的安全性和可控性，它只能证明源代码的存在。”

中国政府想检查外国公司软件源代码的部分动机源于引人注目的爱德华•斯诺登泄密事件。斯诺登泄露的一些文件表明，美国情报部门偷偷在原产于美国的科技产品，比如思科的路由器和交换机上安装了所谓“后门”，以便他们进行网络间谍活动。

为打消中国政府的顾虑，微软去年9月份称，将在北京设立技术透明中心，供中国官方分析微软的各类产品是否存在安全隐患。

微软Windows和设备业务执行副总裁特里•梅森在博客中透露，两年来微软“一直在诚心诚意地和中国政府一起检验Windows 10的安全性”。梅森说，中国版Windows基于面向商业用户的传统Windows 10企业版，但加入了适于中国政府官员的定制功能。

比如说，在这款Windows 10中，中国政府官员可以用他们自己的加密技术来保护不希望别人看到的数据。此外，中国版Windows无法连接微软的OneDrive服务，后者可以让人们把文件存储在微软控制的数据中心里，也就是所谓的云存储。

可以想见，中国政府官员应该想把所有数据都稳妥地放在自己的电脑里，从而尽可能避免把这些信息存储在自己控制范围以外的数据中心里所带来的风险。

微软同时表示，PC制造商联想已成为首位中国版Windows合作伙伴，出售给中国政府的联想电脑将预装这款操作系统。（财富中文网）

译者：Charlie

审稿：夏林

Microsoft said Tuesday that its new Windows 10 China Government Edition is ready for Chinese government agencies to use.

China Customs, the city of Shanghai, and China government-controlled IT company Westone Information Technology are Microsoft’s first customers for the new software. A Microsoft spokesperson said that this is the first time Microsoft has built a custom version of Windows for China.

Microsoft's (msft, +0.34%) debut of a tweaked version of Windows for China highlights the headaches involved when U.S. technology companies do business in that country. For example, an upcoming Chinese cyber security bill would require foreign technology companies to share with government inspectors the underlying software code of their products. The Chinese government claims that it needs to see the software code, which is usually proprietary, in order to verify that there are no flaws that hackers can exploit. Microsoft, along with IBM (ibm, -0.40%) and Intel(intc, +0.25%), criticized the bill in December, according to the Wall Street Journal.

"Sharing source code in itself can’t prove the capability to be secure and controllable," Microsoft said at the time. "It only proves there is source code.”

Part of the reason the Chinese government wants to scan the source code of foreign companies stems from the high-profile government leaks by whistleblower Edward Snowden. Some of Snowden’s leaks revealed that U.S. spy agencies were covertly installing so-called back doors in U.S.-based tech products like Cisco’s networking routers and switches that allowed them to carry out cyber espionage.

To address China’s concerns, Microsoft said in September that it would open a transparency center in Beijing where Chinese government officials could analyze various Microsoft products for security bugs.

Terry Myerson, a Microsoft executive vice president of Windows and devices, said in a blog post that for the past two years Microsoft has “has earnestly cooperated with the Chinese government on the security review of Windows 10.” Myerson said the new China version of Windows is based on the traditional Windows 10 Enterprise Edition for business customers but with extra features tailored to suit Chinese officials.

For example, Chinese government officials can use their own encryption technology in their version of Windows 10 to scramble data that they don’t want others to see. Additionally, the China version of Windows does not allow access to Microsoft’s OneDrive service, which lets people store documents and files on Microsoft-controlled data centers in what’s known as cloud-based storage.

Presumably, Chinese officials want to keep all of their data locked down on their own computers to minimize the risk of that information being stored to data centers that are outside their control.

Microsoft also said that PC maker Lenovo is the company’s first partner that would pre-install the Chinese version of Windows on computers sold to Chinese government officials.