Are These New Chinese Toner Chips from ZHONO Safe to Use? ☹ About the latest chip releases from Zhono, a Chinese company that produces chips for third-party toner cartridges. These chips are compatible with various printer models from HP, Canon, Lexmark, and others.
The safety of these chips depends on what you mean by safe. If you mean safe in terms of not harming your printer or your health, then these chips are maybe safe to use, as long as they are compatible with your printer model and meet the quality standards. However, if you mean safe in terms of not violating any intellectual property rights or laws, then these chips may not be safe to use, as they could infringe on the patents, trademarks, or copyrights of the original printer manufacturers.
According to some sources, some of these Chinese chips may misidentify the third-party cartridges as genuine products from the OEMs, which could deceive the end users and cause legal troubles for the sellers. HP, for example, has confirmed that it has removed dozens of third-party toner cartridge brands from Amazon in the EU and the US because they used infringing chips from Geehy. The US government is also concerned about the potential impact of Chinese legacy chips on the US chip supply chain and national security.
Therefore, if you want to use these Chinese chips, you should be aware of the possible risks and consequences. You should also check the compatibility and quality of the chips before installing them in your toners Alternatively, you could use original cartridges from the OEMs or look for other third-party options that do not use infringing chips.