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What Happened with Supermicro?

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Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#31

Post by bluGill »

jasonhansel wrote: post #25

> He managed to succeed in hacking the BMC with what was essentially a single component that could replace a resistor on the board, demonstrating with his proof of concept that it was plausible to do what Bloomberg’s reporting claimed was being done. Whoa.

Nobody is surprised. The accusation had enough technical details that technical people generally accepted it could work on one motherboard. The logistics of pulling it off in the real world were less believable. (even then China probably could)

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#33

Post by wl »

pmilla1606 wrote: post #8
jandrese wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a theory going around that the whole story was just and elaborate stock manipulation scheme.

But orchestrated by who? Surely not Bloomberg as they'd have too much to lose. And if you have the means to do something like this, why not do it in a more subtle way that doesn't have people asking questions 6 months later? I'm not suggesting you're wrong and I have no clue what happened.

The reporter.

https://www.businessinsider.com/bloomberg-reporters-compensa...

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#34

Post by hughw »

For those dismissing the Bloomberg reporting, what exactly is the scenario you find more believable? Did the reporters improperly extrapolate, either through ignorance or eagerness for a story? Did they unknowingly succumb to CIA disinformation? Knowingly? Something else?

[minor edit for readability]

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#35

Post by Despegar »

blululu wrote: post #20
clay_the_ripper wrote: post #17

Somewhat unrelated: we used to do a lot of business with supermicro. In a meeting one time I asked one of their guys why their billboards are so weird looking (anyone who’s driven down 880 past their building knows what I’m taking about). They have these billboards that have weird slogans and super amateur looking graphics that look like they were made in MS paint. So I asked the guy about them cause I thought it was…

The best photo I could find: http://meritage-partners.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2016/05... I love that old school Silicon Valley aesthetic.

That reminds me of newspaper ads for someone selling beige box PCs.

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#36

Post by derefr »

cantrevealname wrote: post #28
lsc wrote: post #2

Huh. so shortly after the story broke, I bought a bunch of SMCI. (It's actually the first OTC stock I've ever bought. It was easier than I thought, too... I had to call vanguard to enable OTC trading, but after that? super easy.) I sold it months later, at a pretty good profit, mostly 'cause while I think the bloomburg accusations are clearly false, there are huge accounting irregularities surrounding supermicro; get…

> I mean, people were tearing these boards apart, looking for anything. There's no way they could keep that quiet, even if they were willing to disappear people. Without commenting on whether or not I believe the Bloomberg story, I very much doubt that "people were tearing these boards apart", doing reverse hardware-level engineering looking for an unknown. Even in the case of open-source software, with full source c…

I mean, it's not that expensive to just take some hi-res X-ray photos of old and new boards of the same make, and compare the trace paths near each component. Maybe you can even take a visual diff of the X-ray negatives, if you can get everything lined up tightly enough.

You can parallelize this search, because the people doing it don't need to know much about what they're looking for—they're just hunting for visual differences. Unless/until one of them actually finds anything different. At that point, you need better resources to figure out what's different; but at that point, all hell also breaks loose, and you'll get all the resources and help you need to do better analyses.

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#37

Post by derefr »

patorjk wrote: post #9
lsc wrote: post #2

Huh. so shortly after the story broke, I bought a bunch of SMCI. (It's actually the first OTC stock I've ever bought. It was easier than I thought, too... I had to call vanguard to enable OTC trading, but after that? super easy.) I sold it months later, at a pretty good profit, mostly 'cause while I think the bloomburg accusations are clearly false, there are huge accounting irregularities surrounding supermicro; get…

When Tim Cook came out against the story, I did the same thing. It just didn't seem plausible that he would be lying. Then add to that Joe Fitzpatrick's (one of the named sources) discomfort about the story, and something seemed wrong. Time seems to have validated this idea somewhat, but it is interesting that Bloomberg has stood by the story.

> it is interesting that Bloomberg has stood by the story

My guess as to why: one of their reporters was misled by a trusted source, or multiple trusted sources (who were maybe actually catspaws of some-group-or-other who would benefit from getting this story out.)

So now, although Bloomberg would like to speak truth by issuing a retraction, such a move would likely severely damage the original reporter's career; and they don't want to do that for something that wasn't that reporter's fault.

Having some corporation or government agency with tons of resources come along and force or trick a reporter into running a story, would be the journalism equivalent of an insurance agency's "act of God" waiver clause. I would guess that every major news outlet has a policy for protecting and defending reporters who—by hook or by crook—get used as patsies by forces out of the news outlet's control.

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#38

Post by hodgesrm »

blululu wrote: post #20
clay_the_ripper wrote: post #17

Somewhat unrelated: we used to do a lot of business with supermicro. In a meeting one time I asked one of their guys why their billboards are so weird looking (anyone who’s driven down 880 past their building knows what I’m taking about). They have these billboards that have weird slogans and super amateur looking graphics that look like they were made in MS paint. So I asked the guy about them cause I thought it was…

The best photo I could find: http://meritage-partners.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2016/05... I love that old school Silicon Valley aesthetic.

There used to be a big billboard for Data Translation A/D converter cards on I-880 at San Jose city limits. I saw them right after moving to the Bay Area in 1990. It felt like driving through the entrance to paradise. :)

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#39

Post by protomyth »

clay_the_ripper wrote: post #17

Somewhat unrelated: we used to do a lot of business with supermicro. In a meeting one time I asked one of their guys why their billboards are so weird looking (anyone who’s driven down 880 past their building knows what I’m taking about). They have these billboards that have weird slogans and super amateur looking graphics that look like they were made in MS paint. So I asked the guy about them cause I thought it was…

That would actually explain there website. Its awful in only the way a late 90's site can be, but they make great servers so you deal with it. I just wish they made it a bit easier to find everything.

Re: What Happened with Supermicro?

#40

Post by throwaway2048 »

bluGill wrote: post #31
jasonhansel wrote: post #25

> He managed to succeed in hacking the BMC with what was essentially a single component that could replace a resistor on the board, demonstrating with his proof of concept that it was plausible to do what Bloomberg’s reporting claimed was being done. Whoa.

Nobody is surprised. The accusation had enough technical details that technical people generally accepted it could work on one motherboard. The logistics of pulling it off in the real world were less believable. (even then China probably could)

Lots of people were decrying it as impossible due to pin count on the supposed implant device, which looked like a passive component.
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