China Accuses Nvidia of Putting Backdoors into Their Chips – Source: www.schneier.com

Clive Robinson • August 7, 2025 8:59 AM

@ Bruce,

Is what China is claiming or it is claimed that china is claiming actually possible?

Think a moment on

“It said US AI experts had “revealed that Nvidia’s computing chips have location tracking and can remotely shut down the technology”

There are three points to note,

1, US AI experts had revealed…
2, chips have location tracking
3, remotely shut down the technology

So the Chinese claims are based on unsubstantiated “US AI experts” claims…

So firstly :- we’ve no way to know if there is any truth involved.

Secondly have a think on how the chips can do location tracking.

We know China blocks / jams / subverts the US GPS system and other non Chinese GNSS[1] systems like the European Galileo.

We also know China keeps certain details about it’s system restricted. Unlike the other current systems the augmented Be Dou System has not just SMS style messaging in real time, it also communicates two-way with the user terminal thus performs surveillance on all users in range of a ground based base system.

But consider these supposed backdoor chips. They are designed to be used in racks that are effectively Faraday Shields that are in buildings that in turn are Faraday Shields.

What sort of geo-nav system is going to work?

But now likewise consider the “remote shutdown” claim. It would need to work with a command system that would have to use either Radio systems or Wired Systems. Both of which are fairly easy to defend against for non-civilian use.

So I’m not seeing anything that I’d consider anything other than “alleged” in these claims.

Which “technically” makes me rather more than the “skeptical” of,

“Paul Triolo, a China tech expert and partner at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group, said he was “skeptical” about the claims of a deliberate back door being built into Nvidia hardware, pointing to the lack of detail in the announcement.”

What appears to be happening with this Nvidia H20 chip is the nonsense of the US Legislators.

It’s been shown that Nvidia are actually key to the US economy and even bigger than “To big to Fail” financial institutions.

Put in political terms,

“If it ails Nvidia, then the entire US gets sick.”

The flip side of which is kind of,

“If it’s good for Nvidia then the US economy hangs in there for another day.”

Which flies in the opposite direction to political mantra on China Policy…

Thus a legal “fig-leaf” is required to hide the embarrassment of the executive member being held up to ridicule for it’s short comings.

Hence the effectively impossible “tracking and switch off” ideas.

Thus I suspect China knowing this full well is “flipping the bird” as they have nothing to lose by it and quite a lot to gain. Whilst the opposite can be said of the US…

I guess we are going to have to pop the popcorn in the air frier, sit back and watch the “roasting process” as various people get grilled.

[1] Currently there are four “Global Navigation Satellite Systems” in full operation three of which are single nation military sponsored systems of,

1 US “Global Positioning System”(GPS).
2, Russian GLONASS.
3, Chinese “Bei Dou Sytstem” (BDS).

And the civilian multination

4, EU Galileo

An overview comparison of the four can be read at,

https://ndupress.ndu.edu/Media/News/News-Article-View/Article/2999161/beidou-chinas-gps-challenger-takes-its-place-on-the-world-stage/

What is not noted is that Galileo is odd in other respects. The design and original development was done in the UK by Surrey Satellite Systems and the atomic clocks quite a few of which have failed were designed and manufactured by a Swiss company. Neither the UK or Switzerland are members of the EU, which security wise has created political issues.