"UK cyber security agency backs Apple, Amazon China hack denials"
From Reuters:
Britain's national cyber security agency said
on Friday it had no reason to doubt the assessments made by Apple Inc
and Amazon.com Inc challenging a Bloomberg report that their systems
contained malicious computer chips inserted by Chinese intelligence
services.
Bloomberg Businessweek on Thursday cited
17 unnamed intelligence and company sources as saying that Chinese spies
had placed computer chips inside equipment used by around 30 companies,
as well as multiple U.S. government agencies, which would give Beijing
secret access to internal networks.
"We are aware of the media reports but at
this stage have no reason to doubt the detailed assessments made by AWS
and Apple," said the National Cyber Security Centre, a unit of
Britain's eavesdropping agency, GCHQ. AWS refers to Amazon Web Services,
the company's cloud-computing unit.
"The NCSC engages confidentially with security
researchers and urges anybody with credible intelligence about these
reports to contact us,” it said.
Apple contested the Bloomberg report on
Thursday, saying in a statement that its own internal investigations
found no evidence to support the story's claims and that neither the
company, nor its contacts in law enforcement, were aware of any
investigation by the FBI into the matter.
Apple's recently retired general counsel,
Bruce Sewell, told Reuters he called the FBI's then-general counsel
James Baker last year after being told by Bloomberg of an open
investigation into Super Micro Computer Inc , a hardware maker whose
products Bloomberg said were implanted with malicious Chinese chips....MORE