Famous fraud fighter selects new target

Updated: 2013-01-31 19:53

(chinadaily.com.cn)

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Fang Zhouzi, a famous Chinese fraud fighter, has located his new target — the woman known as the mother of 3D printing, Fu Ping.

Fang raised several questions regarding Fu's experiences on Wednesday, which became a hot topic online.

An interview from the Forbes Chinese website on Jan 25 introduced the 55-year-old woman. The article said she went from a Chinese labor camp to top American tech entrepreneur.

The Chinese edition of the interview has now been deleted from the website.

Fu was forced to leave her parents when she was 8 at the start of the "cultural revolution" (1966-76) and was raped when she was working in a factory two years later, the report said.

She was quoted as saying that her thesis on baby girls being killed in rural areas, which was written during her university years in the 1980s, landed her in jail.

Later, she went to the United States, even though she only knew three English phrases and got a master's degree on computer science, the report said.

In 1997, she and her husband set up Geomagic, a software development company focusing on 3D software and technology for design and engineering. They sold it to 3D Systems this month.

Fu got numerous awards over the years due to her business performance and was in the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a think tank of the Obama administration.

But Fang questioned the authenticity of some of her experiences and listed some proof in his Sina blog on Wednesday, saying that "her experiences are too bizarre to be true".

Fang said that her company doesn't make 3D printers, but only provides service and data.

He added that during that period, it was quite rare to see juveniles working in labor camps, and that people like her, who did not receive a good education in their childhoods due to historical reasons, usually cannot make it to university, he said.

He said that he also failed to find any clues to prove that her thesis on baby girls being killed in rural China was ever published on any newspapers.

He also questioned how she could be released so soon after she was arrested.

He said he believes she made intentional exaggerations to promote her autobiography, and that parts of her story are not true.

Fu hadn't responded to Fang's questions yet by Thursday afternoon.

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