Avoiding China for PCBs - anyone tried S Korea?

[peter-h]

May I ask your motivation for avoiding Chinese PCB fabrication?

The main motivation is the difficult and occassionally devious communication.

Then the fairly clear interest in simply shafting the customer. For example we lost $2k when a vendor's email was hacked and we got fake "new bank details". There were clues indeed, in the email headers, etc, but I forgot to check those and decided it was probably real since the account was in the US, and so many Chinese businesses are involved in tax evasion, this made perfect sense Anyway, clearly their gmail account had been compromised, but they just told us to f**k off and pay again if we want the goods. Absolutely no interest in any discussion. Then the tooling destruction at 1 year, etc.

Considering that 99% of the parts placed on the board will be Chinese

They won't be actually by value, not by some way, but you aren't far off as regards component count. Obviously a major difference is that I don't need to deal with whoever makes resistors, etc.

[Veteran68]

But yeah if you are on gmail, with a password like jlcpcb2022, it will be hacked.

If you're on ANY hosted email platform and use stupid passwords, you will get hacked. This isn't exclusive to Gmail.

In the West no real business uses gmail.

Not many use the free "@gmail.com" service, if that's what you're referring to. But many large western corporations use Google for email and office productivity. It used to be called Google Docs, then something else, now Google Workplace. While their email address might end in "@bigcompany.com" it's still very much the exact same Gmail platform that free "@gmail.com" users are using. I have my own hosted Google email domain, in fact, have for near 20 years, since they first offered it. There is zero difference in the platform. The only things that might make them a little more secure is that with enterprise Gmail you can enforce MFA.

My employer, a reasonably large multinational manufacturer, was on Google for email and office productivity apps for 10 years, up until a couple of years ago when we migrated to Microsoft's M365 platform -- which is itself just another hosted platform like Google's. Subject to the same hacking or hijacking when companies or users set it up insecurely or use stupid passwords.

[peter-h]

If you're on ANY hosted email platform and use stupid passwords, you will get hacked. This isn't exclusive to Gmail.

No business should be on any of these platforms.

joe12345@gmail.com just gives the business away as being a totally amateurish outfit.

I agree re google hosted email. I would not use it for other reasons.

[mengfei]

if they can't have their own mail system maybe better use https://proton.me/mail 

[peter-h]

Hmmm, I can tell you that nearly all people who use protonmail are doing (or planning to do, when they join up on a forum) something malicious.

And same goes for most people using a VPN or a TOR browser, notwithstanding all the "privacy" and "civil liberties" arguments. I happen to know quite a lot about this, unfortunately

[AndyBeez]

UK is ringing a wakeup call on China: existential threat

In light of China’s ambition to become a global economic and technological superpower, the UK Government, according to experts, has no strategy to address threats from China.

"Without swift and decisive action the United Kingdom is on a trajectory for the nightmare scenario where China steals blueprints, sets standards, and builds products, exerting political and economic influence at every step, a UK parliamentary committee concluded.
Ernestas Naprys - Senior Journalist - cybernews.com

https://cybernews.com/news/uk-politicians-call-china-existential-threat/

* applies to other nations

[peter-h]

That's true but Chinese are particularly focused on doing that, probably because they are not good at developing their own ideas and technologies. There is a little bit of innovation there but really only a very little bit. The rest is just copied.

This is probably a factor for someone making complete products out there, or even getting bare boards made there where the end product is identifiable. I never put the product P/N on the notation of any PCB I get made out there. With the (above mentioned) high mobility and lack of ethics of their workforce, they won't be stealing just customer email addresses

Obviously firms like Apple have a lot of their own people at say Foxconn watching stuff, but I bet you they won't be leaving any confidential material lying around there.

[sam512bb]

Good day all,

I have had excellent service and PCBs from http://quickturnpcb.co.kr/ located in S Korea.  I have been ordering PCBs from them for over 10 years and their PCBs are very high quality, very fast, and customer serivice is fast and responsive.

Cheers,

Sam

[peter-h]

That's really interesting - thanks.

I tried them a few years ago and they didn't reply to emails. I will try them again.

[nctnico]

But yeah if you are on gmail, with a password like jlcpcb2022, it will be hacked. In the West no real business uses gmail.

Actually many businesses do (as gmail works well enough) but they have their own domain so you don't see the email is handled by gmail.

[Veteran68]

But yeah if you are on gmail, with a password like jlcpcb2022, it will be hacked. In the West no real business uses gmail.

Actually many businesses do (as gmail works well enough) but they have their own domain so you don't see the email is handled by gmail.

Yeah I tried to explain that up in reply #26

[peter-h]

As I said, I know google offer google hosted email; my point was that any company with a xxx@gmail.com address is more than likely to be a bunch of cowboys.

This is ever more off topic but google runs some stupid spam filters. A while ago I ran a test with a friend on gmail, in Greece. Gmail would dump a one-word email (with just "hello") every time. I am sure it won't do it today, because google is changing things all the time, but I periodically email ~1.5k people on a forum I admin so I see all kinds of stuff.

[NorthGuy]

If you're on ANY hosted email platform and use stupid passwords, you will get hacked. This isn't exclusive to Gmail.

No business should be on any of these platforms.

joe12345@gmail.com just gives the business away as being a totally amateurish outfit.

I agree re google hosted email. I would not use it for other reasons.

Lots of companies in the US use google for their email. When I try to answer them through our server, google often put my letters into a spam folder. When I suspect that this has happened, I use a gmail account. And voila - the same text pasted to gmail always reaches the destination. Always. So, there are lots of reasons to use gmail.

I also noticed, when people first contact you, they sometimes use weird gmail account. This is because they don't know you and afraid you may spam them later. Then, once the communication is established, they switch to normal email.

Therefore, weird gmail address is not an indication of anything.

Anyway. Your approach to Chinese companies is totally unfounded. As everywhere, there are good ones and bad ones. I'm sure there are good and bad companies in UK as well.

[stone]

If you want to contact a Chinese company, you need to find a real factory. Many are traders without their own physical factories

[Bud]

Lots of companies in the US use google for their email. When I try to answer them through our server, google often put my letters into a spam folder. When I suspect that this has happened, I use a gmail account. And voila - the same text pasted to gmail always reaches the destination. Always. So, there are lots of reasons to use gmail.

Gmail is provided by Google