Any experienced businessman understands that there's a risk of being duped. Like you imply, the risk depends on the country of origin of your business partner:

Any experienced businessman understands that there's a risk of being duped. Like you imply, the risk depends on the country of origin of your business partner: China is worse than the US; the US is worse than Scandinavia; etc. It also depends on the industry, the reputation and history of the company and its owners, the nature of the deal, and many other factors. It's just part of doing business. If IP theft (or other dishonest behavior) is too extreme, eventually that country would lose foreign business. This is what happened in Russia soon after Gorbachev opened it up: many foreign companies and investors gave up their attempts to enter Russia because they could not handle the amount of trickery being done to them. It took many years for Russia to fix that to some extent. The fact that foreign businesses are still very much present and expand in China means that IP theft and other deceitful practices are within the limits of accepted business risks.