Amazon, China, and national security

[LC]

Fascinating article:

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies

 

 

[hyten1]

https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/security/setting-the-record-straight-on-bloomberg-businessweeks-erroneous-article/

[rb]

Yep, as noted in the article, Amazon is denying everything. In fact every company is quoted as denying this. So is Bloomberg just making this stuff up? The market doesn't seem to think so - Super Market is down 40%.

[LC]

Wow quite the development, thanks for posting hyten!

[Jurgis]

Yep, as noted in the article, Amazon is denying everything. In fact every company is quoted as denying this. So is Bloomberg just making this stuff up? The market doesn't seem to think so - Super Market is down 40%.

 

See what oddballstocks says in AMZN thread: he claims that companies have to deny it by law if it's some kind of national security investigation? I have no clue if this is true. Somebody more knowledgeable in laws/etc has to comment.  8)

[LC]

Yep, as noted in the article, Amazon is denying everything. In fact every company is quoted as denying this. So is Bloomberg just making this stuff up? The market doesn't seem to think so - Super Market is down 40%.

 

See what oddballstocks says in AMZN thread: he claims that companies have to deny it by law if it's some kind of national security investigation? I have no clue if this is true. Somebody more knowledgeable in laws/etc has to comment.  8)

I am not sure about that from a legal perspective.

 

However just logically it makes sense. If you are a gov't contractor with ties to strategic assets your lips are definitely tied.

[rb]

Huge swaths of China tech are down hard overnight. Lenovo is the standout, down 20%.

 

Big moves. Despite all of the denials. It somehow doesn't feel like an article where the writer was producing a work of fiction. Feels more like it was more or less known (or felt) that something like this was going on and the article points that they were caught with the hand in the cookie jar.

[shalab]

rb, +1. The article seems genuine. I don't believe the denials from apple and amazon - these folks have massive business interests in China and have every reason to deny the article. They can't do business in China if they fight the government.

 

Huge swaths of China tech are down hard overnight. Lenovo is the standout, down 20%.

 

Big moves. Despite all of the denials. It somehow doesn't feel like an article where the writer was producing a work of fiction. Feels more like it was more or less known (or felt) that something like this was going on and the article points that they were caught with the hand in the cookie jar.

[cubsfan]

There is no doubt China has been the leader in industrial espionage. The Chinese Red Army steals trade secrets every day.

It's been going on for years. I have friends who work at CrowdStrike and have traced so much of the activity back to the

Chinese Red Army. This hardware play is new to me though, but on the software side, it's a business for them.

 

The US government has know about this for years, but feeling that China may actually move toward democracy, and being

such a valuable trading partner, etc - we've not rocked the boat. The plan always seem to just try and block them via technology.

 

Perhaps shining the spotlight on them with the public is the right way to go.