Apple, Amazon, SuperMicro deny reports of Chinese microchip infiltration

MANILA, Philippines – Apple, Amazon, and SuperMicro have denied Bloomberg’s claims that their servers were infiltrated by Chinese agents who inserted microchips into their equipment.

According to Reuters, Apple Vice President for Information Security George Stathakopoulos wrote a letter to the US Senate and House commerce committees to say the company found no evidence supporting the allegations.

“Apple’s proprietary security tools are continuously scanning for precisely this kind of outbound traffic, as it indicates the existence of malware or other malicious activity. Nothing was ever found,” he wrote.

Stathakopoulos said they never found the reported malicious chips and vulnerabilities in their investigation.

Amazon, meanwhile, similarly denied allegations that Elemental, a software startup the company acquired in 2015, integrated with the chips in question when it had its servers assembled by SuperMicro.

“We’ve re-reviewed our records relating to the Elemental acquisition for any issues related to SuperMicro, including re-examining a third-party security audit that we conducted in 2015 as part of our due diligence prior to the acquisition. We’ve found no evidence to support claims of malicious chips or hardware modifications,” Amazon said in a statement.

At the center of the allegations is SuperMicro, a California-based equipment manufacturer who reportedly sold Apple, Amazon, and the US Department of Defense the tampered servers. SuperMicro, however, also denied the allegations and said they don’t design networking chips.

“While we would cooperate with any government investigation, we are not aware of any investigation regarding this topic nor have we been contacted by any government agency in this regard. We are not aware of any customer dropping Supermicro as a supplier for this type of issue,” the company said in a statement.

The Verge added the statements made by the companies were backed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS said they have no reason to doubt them or believe otherwise.

Despite the forceful denials from companies involved, Bloomberg stands by their report and stated that their sources counter the statements issued. – Rappler.com