So nice of China to put all of its network zero-day vulns in one giant database no one will think to break into • The Register

Chinese makers of network software and hardware must alert Beijing within two days of learning of a security vulnerability in their products under rules coming into force in China this year.

Details of holes cannot be publicized until the bugs are fixed. Malicious exploit code cannot be released. There are restrictions on disclosing details of flaws to foreign organizations. And vendors will be under pressure to address these vulnerabilities as soon as they can and set up bounty programs to reward researchers.

The regulations are intended to tighten up the nation’s cyber-security defenses, crack down on the handling and dissemination of bugs, and keep China’s elite up to speed on exploitable flaws present in Chinese-made communications systems, wherever in the world that technology may be deployed.

It appears these rules ensure Beijing will be among the first to know of security weaknesses in equipment and software potentially present in foreign infrastructure and networks as well as domestic deployments. The rules were issued on Tuesday, come into effect on September 1, and apply to people and organizations operating within China. The following articles stuck out to us:

Though the rules are a little ambiguous in places, judging from the spirit of them, they throw a spanner in the works for Chinese researchers who work with, or hope to work with, zero-day vulnerability brokers. These sorts of regulations matter a lot: infosec experts in the Middle Kingdom earlier pulled out of exploit contests like Pwn2Own due to changes to the law within China.

“Chinese teams stopped participating in Pwn2Own after 2017 when there were regulatory changes that no longer allowed for participation in global exploit contests,” Brian Gorenc, head of ZDI and Pwn2Own at Trend Micro, told The Register on Wednesday.

It will also complicate matters for those hoping to engage with foreign bug bounty programs, which may or may not follow…