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Amazon Offloaded Its Chinese Server Business Because it Was Compromised, Report Says (techcrunch.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: It looks like Amazon's move to sell off its physical server business in China last year was because the unit had been compromised by a Chinese government spying program. That's according to a report from Bloomberg which details how the Chinese government infiltrated a number of U.S. companies by sneaking tiny chips onto motherboards from Supermicro. They then became part of servers deployed by the companies giving remote operatives potential access to data. It's a huge story that includes a comparatively small but important passage shedding light on Amazon's China deal last November -- the U.S. firm sold the physical server business to local partner Beijing Sinnet for 2 billion yuan, or around $300 million. That transaction initially sparked reports that AWS would exit China, but Amazon later clarified it planned to continue to operate its cloud services in China. Selling the physical server business, it said, was down to the fact that "Chinese law forbids non-Chinese companies from owning or operating certain technology for the provision of cloud services." While it is correct that China did introduce cybersecurity laws that placed restrictions on overseas firms and appeared to give the government unprecedented access to data, the Bloomberg report claims that Amazon's China-based servers were in fact offloaded because they were plagued with compromised servers.
That the "hardware" or "chips" hadn't been physically changed... but they were a bit hazy on the software that was loaded on those chips.
... for something completely different. A story that references the previous dubious story!
So it's not a dupe, OK?? It's not, I tell you!
Remind me to avoid the Amazon Hospitals (tm) in the future....
OTOH I'm not sure China wants foreign investment. This is the same country that spent a fortune figuring out how to make pens as nice as the Germans instead of just importing the occasional nice pen. China is very nationalistic.
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You're new here, aren't you? Its happened plenty of times before and will again.
"Chinese law forbids non-Chinese companies from owning or operating certain technology for the provision of cloud services."
Gee, I wonder why?
The government thought process is obvious: We have done it to everyone else so we know it can be done. Therefore we are going to make a law so nobody can do it to us.
China is the enemy.
China & United States are not our enemies but unwanted spies and sometimes e-criminals.
Home microprocessors (from US and China) are plagued of backdoors, trojans, etc.
Are you window-lickers even trying anymore?
Those are wi-fi enabled. I noticed some erratic behavior activity around PRC labor day, last May
It does raise a yellow, er red, er, um checkered flag of sorts.
// chink in their armor //
It does raise a yellow, er, red flag.
Remind me to avoid the Amazon Hospitals (tm) in the future....
If you're a member of Amazon Prime you will be guaranteed to be delivered to the afterlife in 2 days or less.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Wasn't it confirmed by the Snowden leaks that Uncle Sam intercepts hardware during shipment to be compromised?
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
If you bought ANYTHING electronic that has the ability to perform communications and that product came within 1,000 miles of Red China than you should expect that it has been hacked. People view China through their own eyes. The fact are that China is NOT anything like the rest of the world. They do not have compassion which is a Christian teaching. If you do not contribute to the Great State than your life isn't worth dirt. If you are elderly or disabled you should just up and die as your time is up. China worships only the state and there is no other purpose in life but to better the state at all costs. 30 MILLION people died of starvation under MAO from the 1940's and 1950's.
Mao's Great Leap Forward 'killed 45 million in four years. Nothing new there but I bet that 99% of people who read this haven't a clue how many 100's of million have been and still are being killed today. Sure, they're Muslims and Christians so you don't care.because you only worship your own body and your self in your hedonist fashions.
This generation DESERVES everything that will happen to it. World War 3 will occur. Russia and China will start it. And it will nuclear and it will effect everyone's game playing abilities.
Really, they "...weren't paying their taxes" and were about to be "disappeared" so they got the fuck out. https://www.independent.co.uk/...
SO is amazon using intel chips? If so there's the intel management engine which is basically a backdoor that can do absolutely anything including run when the computer is turned off (but powered).
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
What chip? How about a little specifics here, dumb article.
The Bloomberg link is worth reading, grain of rice -sized HW backdoor and all. Things have progressed quite a bit since 2005, when I opened up an Averatec laptop and noticed a stealth CastleNet mini comm board -- no, it wasn't on any bus or otherwise part of the architecture, it was "in the air", GLUED to the underside of the top cover, with just a cable running to the Ethernet port! Most likely injection somewhere in the supply chain. How crude, huh. What a difference 10 years can make.
None of this changes the fact that China is the enemy.
Seriously, if AWS dropped a whole DC due to contamination, what the hell is going on with Apple and their chinese iCloud DC, being run by a local chinese company? Has all their efforts to lock down their iCloud china keys been in vain?