6 ms·

There's something fishy going on here. I don't really think that Bloomberg would fabricate the story out of whole cloth, so there has to be something there som

There's something fishy going on here. I don't really think that Bloomberg would fabricate the story out of whole cloth, so there has to be something there somewhere. It's possible that they were duped, but if they didn't make some efforts to corroborate the story, that would be shockingly poor journalism, the kind of thing you expect from the National Enquirer, not a major financial paper. On the other side, it doesn't take much of a lapse in QA to let a single bad part through, when you are dealing with billions of components like Apple is.

nneonneo 8y ago
Maybe it doesn’t take much of a lapse in QA to let a single bad article through, when you’re dealing with hundreds of articles like Businessweek is...
- jedieaston 8y ago
  It was the cover of last weeks issue, they had to have a known-good story for it to make it that far.
saudioger 8y ago
My understanding is that while the sources were left anonymous, they were definitely confirmed as intelligence agents by Bloomberg... so if they were duped, it's a pretty serious (propaganda-level?) duping.
- robmiller 8y ago
  Well, the Smith-Mundt Act[0] was repealed in an NDAA passed a few years ago under Obama... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act
- WillPostForFood 8y ago
  This is where Bloomberg is already caught playing little loose with the truth. They are saying they have 17 sources, some of which are intelligence officials, but that doesn't mean they have 17 people confirming the specifics of these incidents. Apple's response notes that the accusation is reliant on a /single/ anonymous source. Intelligence officials may have simply confirmed that China is interested and tried to do this kind of thing.
  - Bartweiss 8y ago
    As Greenwald pointed out years ago, it's sensible for readers to ask why sources are anonymous. If they're saying something inconvenient to their government or employer, that's neutral or even positive for their credibility. If they're saying something convenient but classified or otherwise not-for-release, that's generally neutral; 'authorized leaking' is an established practice. But if they're saying something that won't cause them problems and isn't a secret, then it's strange. It raises the possibility that they're anonymous because the claim isn't true and they don't want to be embarrassed, or even that the story writer encouraged anonymity to hide the weakness of the source. If Bloomberg is saying "we used 17 sources including intelligence officials and an anonymous source who confirmed the hack", well, easy money says the key anonymous source doesn't measure up to the other 16.
module0000 8y ago
That story either caused or was coincidentally timed with a multi-day nasdaq futures crash. The story broke, and within minutes the NQ was in free-fall. DJI and squawks all attributed the sell off in-progress to the breaking story. Any possible fine levvied against bloomberg would be absolutely insignificant against the profits that crash created. Whether that was intentional is pure speculation...but it's sure interesting.
jackconnor 8y ago
They wouldn’t intentionally, but they employ a lot of shady, targeted journalism to get their technoscare stories. As far as I know, they don’t have and have never seen an actual physical one of these chinese pins. Why they still ran the story based on just interviews is nuts, they had to know they’d get called out and (probably)sued for hundreds of millions of dollars. Seems like a bad idea, when your only evidence is the anonymous testimony of less than 20 people.
tptacek 8y ago
Didn't one of Bloomberg's own technical sources do an interview on Risky.biz yesterday about how flawed the story was, and release letters they sent to Bloomberg after reading the story complaining about it?
- nyolfen 8y ago
  yes, tldl he’s an expert in hardware backdoors who spent several months emailing explainers about how a hypothetical implant could work to an author of the piece and it turned out to be nearly verbatim the same as the one in the article, which he found suspicious https://risky.biz/RB517_feature/ https://risky.biz/RB517_feature/
JamesLeonis 8y ago
Putting my paranoid hat on, this is eerily similar to the Iraq buildup. From the anonymous govt intel sources to the pictures in a mainstream publication to the throaty denials. What really drives the point home in my mind is that FAANGs have no way of completely exonerating themselves in the Court of Public Opinion, much like Iraq, without caving into several of the demands. To put my tin foil hat on, will we be seeing increased pressure for physical inspections of FAANG hardware?
- DenisM 8y ago
  While you’re wearing that hat consider that a future legislation on trade restriction with China might benefit from this story, even if the story proves false.
tim333 8y ago
It was kind of explained in another HN story earlier today. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18174930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18174930 Basically one expert described how a hack could be done and the journalist re-wrote it as here's how China tried to hack. >In September when he asked me like, “Okay, hey, we think it looks like a signal amplifier or a coupler. What’s a coupler? What does it look like?” […] I sent him a link to Mouser, a catalog where you can buy a 0.006 x 0.003 inch coupler. Turns out that’s the exact coupler in all the images in the story.

nneonneo 8y ago

Maybe it doesn’t take much of a lapse in QA to let a single bad article through, when you’re dealing with hundreds of articles like Businessweek is...

jedieaston 8y ago
It was the cover of last weeks issue, they had to have a known-good story for it to make it that far.

saudioger 8y ago

My understanding is that while the sources were left anonymous, they were definitely confirmed as intelligence agents by Bloomberg... so if they were duped, it's a pretty serious (propaganda-level?) duping.

robmiller 8y ago
Well, the Smith-Mundt Act[0] was repealed in an NDAA passed a few years ago under Obama... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith%E2%80%93Mundt_Act
WillPostForFood 8y ago
This is where Bloomberg is already caught playing little loose with the truth. They are saying they have 17 sources, some of which are intelligence officials, but that doesn't mean they have 17 people confirming the specifics of these incidents. Apple's response notes that the accusation is reliant on a /single/ anonymous source. Intelligence officials may have simply confirmed that China is interested and tried to do this kind of thing.
- Bartweiss 8y ago
  As Greenwald pointed out years ago, it's sensible for readers to ask why sources are anonymous. If they're saying something inconvenient to their government or employer, that's neutral or even positive for their credibility. If they're saying something convenient but classified or otherwise not-for-release, that's generally neutral; 'authorized leaking' is an established practice. But if they're saying something that won't cause them problems and isn't a secret, then it's strange. It raises the possibility that they're anonymous because the claim isn't true and they don't want to be embarrassed, or even that the story writer encouraged anonymity to hide the weakness of the source. If Bloomberg is saying "we used 17 sources including intelligence officials and an anonymous source who confirmed the hack", well, easy money says the key anonymous source doesn't measure up to the other 16.

module0000 8y ago

That story either caused or was coincidentally timed with a multi-day nasdaq futures crash. The story broke, and within minutes the NQ was in free-fall. DJI and squawks all attributed the sell off in-progress to the breaking story. Any possible fine levvied against bloomberg would be absolutely insignificant against the profits that crash created. Whether that was intentional is pure speculation...but it's sure interesting.

jackconnor 8y ago

They wouldn’t intentionally, but they employ a lot of shady, targeted journalism to get their technoscare stories. As far as I know, they don’t have and have never seen an actual physical one of these chinese pins. Why they still ran the story based on just interviews is nuts, they had to know they’d get called out and (probably)sued for hundreds of millions of dollars. Seems like a bad idea, when your only evidence is the anonymous testimony of less than 20 people.

tptacek 8y ago

Didn't one of Bloomberg's own technical sources do an interview on Risky.biz yesterday about how flawed the story was, and release letters they sent to Bloomberg after reading the story complaining about it?

nyolfen 8y ago
yes, tldl he’s an expert in hardware backdoors who spent several months emailing explainers about how a hypothetical implant could work to an author of the piece and it turned out to be nearly verbatim the same as the one in the article, which he found suspicious https://risky.biz/RB517_feature/ https://risky.biz/RB517_feature/

JamesLeonis 8y ago

Putting my paranoid hat on, this is eerily similar to the Iraq buildup. From the anonymous govt intel sources to the pictures in a mainstream publication to the throaty denials. What really drives the point home in my mind is that FAANGs have no way of completely exonerating themselves in the Court of Public Opinion, much like Iraq, without caving into several of the demands. To put my tin foil hat on, will we be seeing increased pressure for physical inspections of FAANG hardware?

DenisM 8y ago
While you’re wearing that hat consider that a future legislation on trade restriction with China might benefit from this story, even if the story proves false.

tim333 8y ago

It was kind of explained in another HN story earlier today. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18174930 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18174930 Basically one expert described how a hack could be done and the journalist re-wrote it as here's how China tried to hack. >In September when he asked me like, “Okay, hey, we think it looks like a signal amplifier or a coupler. What’s a coupler? What does it look like?” […] I sent him a link to Mouser, a catalog where you can buy a 0.006 x 0.003 inch coupler. Turns out that’s the exact coupler in all the images in the story.