Microsoft, which announced its intention to develop the China-specific Windows operating system back in December, has now built a Chinese version of Windows 10 that included “more management and security controls” and less bloatware. The company has just announced a new version of its Windows 10, which is now ready for Chinese government agencies to use.
Windows 10 Enterprise Edition already provides several security, identity, and manageability features that governments and enterprises need, but this Windows 10 Chinese Government Edition (called as “Windows 10 Zhuangongban,” or “Windows 10 Specially-provided Edition”) will let the country use the management feature to monitor and deploy updates as needed, manage telemetry, and use its own encrypted algorithms in order to secure data that they do not want others to see.
The Chinese version of Windows 10 does not allow access to features that are not needed by Chinese government employees like Microsoft’s OneDrive service that let people store their documents and files on Microsoft-controlled data centers. It even strips out many of the apps and services aimed at consumers, and instead adds more administrator and security controls.
Through a joint venture with CETC, a Chinese state-run technology and defense corporation, Microsoft has completed the first version of the specialized Windows version.
Back in 2014, China banned Windows 8 installs on government computers amid concerns about security and US surveillance. Even in the wake of that, China had been pushing its custom version of Windows XP and its forked version of Linux.
