> If you don't want people to copy and improve your hardware, don't give them permission to copy and improve your hardware.
As if Chinese cloners would give a shit about permissions. You got everything there from "independents" reverse-engineering clothing or circuits over the "official" manufacturing contractor running "ghost shifts" [1] with original parts that got binned in QA to supposedly trustable brands getting shafted on their end [2].
Regarding electronics, bunnie has also dedicated a chapter about fakes in his book about that world [3]. China simply runs on an entirely different value system than Western countries, one where what we see as theft they see as a completely normal part of doing business [4]. Unfortunately, our politicians never realised that and still continue treating China as an "equal partner".