Posted on 07/28/2026 7:16:50 PM PDT by BenLurkin
The Trump administration on Tuesday announced a ban on new foreign-made humanoid robot imports to the US over "unacceptable risks" to the country's national security.
The move applies to advanced robots - including humanoid and four-legged machines. Many of them are made in China, which is locked in a race with the US to develop robotics and artificial intelligence (AI).
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) also banned the import of power inverters - a device used in data centres and solar panels - which it said could also pose a risk to the US economy.
FCC chairman Brendan Carr said the agency was doing its part "to secure America's critical supply chains".
The BBC has contacted the Chinese embassy in Washington as well as major Chinese robot manufacturers Unitree, UBTech and AgiBot.
The FCC has added the items to its Covered List - a register of goods and services that are deemed a risk to US national security.
The ban applies to new foreign-produced advanced robotic devices and power inverters and does not prevent the sale or import of any existing models that had been previously authorised by the FCC.
The FCC cited concerns that the use of foreign-made inverters could allow overseas firms to turn them off, steal data, facilitate remote access and surveillance by "foreign government actors, or be otherwise exploited through a cyberattack."
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
When robots become proprietary you will have counterfeit robots.
Imagine roving bands of thieving robots, or robot vandalism.
The more sophisticated the robot or electronics then the more likely to be bought by the wealthy, and the greater the odds of being owned and used by people high in government and business and other areas who are worth spying on.
If you can train a dog to steal bikini tops at the beach, just imagine what you can use a robot for.
Does this mean Chinese Sex Robots are not coming in?
Asking for a friend.
And uh, help my wife out around the house. Morgan Fairchild; whom I've seen naked. (Yeah, that's the ticket.)
Do you mean the classic old Ad about Coppertone Tan Lotion?
That immediately comes to mind. One of those ‘lighthearted’ Ads that would never be approved of today.
Exactly the movie I was thinking about!
I meant when girls lay chest down and undo their top to avoid tan lines, the dog can steal that, or of course a guy can use the old trick of dumping ice water on her, which of course makes her jump up in a scream.
That mention of the Coppertone ad is a sad thing to think about, we are so degraded and decadent now that the Coppertone ad would be see by the left as sexual today.
The Coppertone ad got cancelled due to being considered Child Porn.
Exactly, the more twisted the left becomes the more they see sub text in everything, words, photos, ads, old books, old movies, old songs, old statues, old symbols, even things like building designs and the Interstate Highway system.
Need a ban on all chink humanoids.🙄
Would you consider using the phrase ‘Asian featured’ humanoids vs what you wrote? Just asking.
Totally supportive of this. Maybe even more than supportive, but we MUST recognize that protectionist bans are a temporary measure, not a permanent solution.
Restricting Chinese robotics (among other things …EV cars, AI, etc) is 100% strategically useful to buy time, but it must (must!!) be coupled with aggressive investment in US AI, robotics, and leading-edge tech. It must also include students who are achievers see the benefit of going to STEM courses, and massive investment there. The brilliance and ‘can do’ attitude of Americans in past decades needs to be brought back (and honored/admired/valued), otherwise China will just continue churning out between 4-6 million STEM graduates every year. Now, someone can argue that many of those are not ‘that good,’ the fact still remains that when you have 5.8m STEM graduates, you only need 1% to be great and that is more than enough.
Way more than enough.
If our only strategy is containment, it will eventually fail. We have seen this play out repeatedly. The restrictions on Huawei and advanced GPUs initially severely impacted Chinese firms, but they ultimately acted as a catalyst for MASSIVE state investment in domestic capabilities.
Today, they have their own chips and domestic GPU alternatives. While they may not rival Nvidia’s top tier (just yet), they are rapidly reaching a level of ‘good enough.’ The same dynamic is currently unfolding with ASML lithography machines, where China is struggling with efficiency, power use, lower yields, and not being able to (for now) come up with the same level of tech (Chinese DUV approach is very inferior to ASML’s EUV lithography). But give them time, and between stealing tech, puri by massive amounts of cash, and the 1-5% of Chinese engineers that are absolutely world class, they will get there. And then what? ASML’s moat will be largely filled in, even if ASML remains ahead. i would not be surprised if by the end of this year China achieves extreme UV lithography close to what ASML does, even if inferior. That will be a HUGE jump from China’s current DUV.
Same thing with AI models. Last year people were saying China was 12-18 months behind. Earlier this year it was 6 months. A week ago China came out with the K3 model, which was available for download from yesterday (with many American companies downloading it since it provides a cheaper alternative to the expensive Fable and Sol model variants from Anthropic and OpenAi).
The solution there from the Administration is to consider banning open weight AI models. Again, effective temporary measures (eg to enable American open weight models to be created to provide a cheaper alternative alternative to expensive frontier models), but a failed medium-to-long term strategy (as it does not stop non-American companies from taking advantage of the Chinese models).
Anyways, let’s see how it goes. I am supportive of temporary bans, but it needs to come with massive domestic investment and a culture shift back to the mindset that had Americans landing on the moon.
Without that, it is a 100% waste of time that ironically forces China to be better.
Time will tell.
Sarah Connor wept…
Robot wars!
But teaching a 8 year old to put a condom is okay.
Yeah, got it
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