Intel products sold in China should be subject to a security review, the Cybersecurity Association of China said on Wednesday, alleging the US chipmaker has “constantly harmed” the country’s national security and interests. While
is an industry group rather than a government body, it has close ties to the Chinese state and the raft of accusations against Intel , published in a long post on its official WeChat account, could trigger a security review from China’s powerful cyberspace regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China . Intel and the CAC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company’s shares closed 1.
said. Last year, CAC barred domestic operators of key infrastructure from buying products made by US memory chipmaker Micron Technology Inc after deeming the company’s products as having failed its network security review. A similar security review on Intel products could negatively impact the company’s revenues, over a quarter of which came from China last year.
in its post accuses Intel chips, including Xeon processors used for artificial intelligence tasks, of carrying several vulnerabilities, concluding that Intel “has major defects when it comes to product quality, security management, indicating that it is extremely irresponsible attitude towards customers.” The industry group goes on to state that operating systems embedded in all Intel processors are vulnerable to backdoors created by the US National Security Agency .
said. A ban, even if temporary, on Intel products could further tighten the supply of AI chips in the Chinese market, which has struggled to find viable alternatives to cutting-edge products from Nvidia which dominate globally but are now banned from export to China. Intel this year secured orders for its Xeon processors from several Chinese state-linked agencies for use in AI work, according to a Reuters review of public tenders.