APEC sidelines: Xi gifts Xiaomi phones, cracks ‘backdoor’ joke

Xi’s smartphone gift sparks debate

A pair of Chinese Xiaomi smartphones gifted by Xi Jinping to South Korean President Lee Jae Myung during the recent APEC meeting raised eyebrows when Xi quipped, “You can check if there’s a backdoor,” as the phones were handed over, according to a report on the New York Post.

The scene at Gyeongju

On November 1, 2025, the two leaders met in Gyeongju, South Korea, in the closing hours of the APEC summit. As part of the gift exchange, Xi presented Lee with two Xiaomi smartphones alongside more traditional items—Chinese calligraphy tools and Korean lacquer trays featured elsewhere in the diplomatic exchange.

When Lee inspected the phones and asked, “How is the communication security?”, Xi answered with the tongue-in-cheek line about a possible “backdoor,” prompting a moment of light laughter but leaving room for deeper reflection.

Layers of meaning

The gift carries more than surface-level courtesy. Xiaomi is a Chinese tech brand; giving its product to a South Korean leader (in a country dominated by global smartphone giant Samsung) touches directly on technology, supply-chain competition and trust in networked devices. Analysts see the message as two-fold: an assertion of Chinese technological capability and a subtle prompt about security.

That Xi joked about checking for a backdoor—the kind of hidden access tool that security agencies worry about—may have been light-hearted, but it also brought into focus real concerns about device security, especially in high-stakes diplomacy where mobile communications matter.

Implications for South Korea and beyond

For South Korea, the exchange comes at a delicate moment. Seoul must balance its economic ties with China (its largest trading partner) and its security alliance with the US, which has publicly flagged Chinese tech companies over concerns about network integrity. Receiving Chinese phones, and the joke about “backdoors,” puts the spotlight on how South

Korea manages tech diplomacy.

For the wider tech-security scene, the moment adds to ongoing debates: Are gifts of gadgets in diplomatic contexts purely symbolic, or do they carry embedded security risks? The question of “check if there’s a backdoor” is both hyper-literal and metaphorical. It forces attention on device provenance, software trustworthiness and how states view technology as part of influence.

What this says about Xi’s strategy

By choosing smartphones as a gift, Xi may be signalling that China is no longer just a manufacturing base—it’s a producer of consumer tech meant for global symbols. The moment also shows a softer side of power projection: humour, personalization and direct communication at the leader-to-leader level. Yet at the same time, the underlying undertone is about visibility: the device is public, its maker is Chinese, and its security is implicitly questioned.

Final thought

A pair of phones might seem a small part of summit day photo-ops. But when they come from China’s leader to South Korea’s president—and include a joke about checking for backdoors—they offer a sharp snapshot of how technology, diplomacy and trust weave together in the digital age.