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The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

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Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#651
post #595

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing being called a national security risk is a lack of domestic production capability. No one is saying Canadian steel is sabotaged or something.

Though it is, because it happened with Kobe Steel. (Not saying Canada specifically.) They faked the data on what it could handle; and with things such as aircraft, lives depend on that data.

That isn't a Japanese steel concern though, that's a steel manufacturing concern. U.S. Steel could do the same thing.

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#652

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait a minute... So your company has a Chinese equipment supplier, finds out that the supplier is tampering with your purchased equipment, and your solution is to add criteria to the incoming inspection? No wonder China keeps screwing with you guys. You aren't supposed to eat that cost! Write a PO with tons of fine print that says "We will disassembly units at random for compliance inspection. Non compliant products…

Probably the cost per unit is too attractive

Also it forces their customer's customer to essentially subsidize production cost.

Some amount of financial theft happens to random consumers who don't know where it came from and this stolen money is paid in bribes to employees as a subsidy to their low wage.

As a result this immoral company externalizes aspects of their cost structure to greater society.

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They get wiped, X-rayed, disassembled and checked, including any accessory (chargers, mice, etc.). Given how sophisticated these attacks can be, I'd think they'd issue disposable equipment to be destroyed on return, like a cheap netbook or something. I don't see how you could trust an individual viewing a simple X-ray scan to detect some extra microchip the size of a signal conditioning coupler.

Procedures change, as attacks get more sophisticated the next step could be disposable devices. But an attack like the one described in this article won't be mitigated by having a disposable device. On the other hand having your laptop "hijacked" while on a business trip will most likely involve some extra PCB or components that are a little more obvious that something that's "built in". Then again many companies or…

Does the security team have any motivation to reduce waste? Unless you're finding hacks in your devices already I see no reason to think they aren't just making you jump through hoops because it's funny.

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#656

This reminds me of that old story about the Xerox copy machines that the Soviet Union bought. Where each unit was planted with a image recorder. And for years, the American spy agencies had a great laugh, that they were able to intercept all the documents that the Russians made a copy of. Back then, this was an off-network infiltration. Where the copied images, were retrieved during regular servicing intervals by a X…

I had never heard of this...but now I can only imagine how exciting this must have been as one of the engineers-- working on a top secret project for the CIA in an abandoned bowling alley: https://electricalstrategies.com/about/in-the-news/spies-in-... edit: whoops, looks like amatecha beat me to posting more info

Exciting, but not so ethical. We owe society to put our knowledge towards making it better for all people, not just "our team".

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#657

We need open source hardware designs that can be built locally (where ever your local might be). This black box hardware crap has to stop. Smart people who know how all this works need to dump all their knowledge in to a design and a process. Trade secrets are keeping us not only limited in choices but exposed to bad actors who can control a link in the supply chain.

>Smart people who know how all this works need to dump all their knowledge in to a design and a process.

Great, are you paying?

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait a minute... So your company has a Chinese equipment supplier, finds out that the supplier is tampering with your purchased equipment, and your solution is to add criteria to the incoming inspection? No wonder China keeps screwing with you guys. You aren't supposed to eat that cost! Write a PO with tons of fine print that says "We will disassembly units at random for compliance inspection. Non compliant products…

There were other considerations like the fact we were actually buing it from large reputable company and what happened was that some employees were doing it with no involvement of the company. The fact is, doing any kind of hardware production in China, you have to be aware Chineese have different value system and you would not be suited doing any business if you throw tantrum at any sign of apparent dishonesty (assu…

Here you have it... Moral relativism should get you paid less as an employee. Regardless, the modern craze of relativism should still require evidence.

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#659

Amazon are going all out on the denial https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/security/setting-the-record-str...

Investors don't seem to care, stock has slid over 2% today and it's still going down.

I wouldn't read too much into it. Stocks in general are down today, as bond yields go up.

Re: The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate Amazon and Apple

#660

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The fact is, doing any kind of hardware production in China, you have to be aware Chineese have different value system and you would not be suited doing any business if you throw tantrum at any sign of apparent dishonesty Sounds like the solution is not doing business with them and pushing for a ban on others doing business with them (since this largely has a socialized cost when things go wrong, such as individual…

OMG, that is so so so so brilliant! I'm going to go tell my boss right now that the suppliers better suite up, otherwise we are going right to their more expensive, less experienced vendor and will delay our product launch for a year....and likely still suffer the same problem. Those Chinese vendors better shape up or we're going to really teach them a lesson by driving ourself out of business right quick!

You can be as sarcastic as you want, but these stories are absolutely indicative of a much larger problem. It might be beyond the capacity of one company to fix, but in the aggregate they represent a serious political and economic threat and need to be dealt with one way or another. Preferably by literally anyone other than Donald Trump.
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