5 ms·

There has to be more to this story that we don't know. Bloomberg has a lot to lose by publishing such a harsh claim that's not extremely fact-checked. Reliable

There has to be more to this story that we don't know. Bloomberg has a lot to lose by publishing such a harsh claim that's not extremely fact-checked. Reliable newspapers generally don't throw around anonymous government sources without doing background checks on these people. I have little doubt that they got the information from who they say they did. At this point I wonder if they should stop protecting their sources on this story and see if that shakes out any truth. The problem with that is of course that it erodes trust for future sources, and potentially puts these sources at personal risk. But if not doing so starts putting the entire publication into question, that might be a risk they have to take.

afarah 8y ago
> Reliable newspapers generally don't throw around anonymous government sources Huh...
admax88q 8y ago
> At this point I wonder if they should stop protecting their sources on this story and see if that shakes out any truth. That would be a mistake. Don't just throw your sources to the wolves if you couldn't prove their story. They should press their sources for proof, or stronger evidence. If they can't find any then they should issue a retraction.
- sixothree 8y ago
  I would love to see a board in hand.
- e12e 8y ago
  You might, if you can with certainty say: oh, look, this was a propaganda op by these agents of this TLA.
- crispyambulance 8y ago
  The "should have" pressed the sources for hard proof, or found examples in the wild of adulterated servers before publishing the story. That ship has sailed, of course. But if what was reported was actually true the best thing that can happen now, for Bloomberg and the public, is for their sources to step forward voluntarily with proof. Admittedly, that will take a lot of courage in today's political climate, but if it's not all just bullshit, highly principled people may do it. What I would like to know is what the Bloomberg reporters expected would happen as a result of this story?? Did they think Supermicro and Apple would just admit it? Then what?
  - exoesquitur 8y ago
    If this is actually a thing, it's probably 5 eyes that has the most invested in the tech. (Waves hands and puts on tinfoil hat) Check mate, atheists.
  - lupire 8y ago
    If the sources are willing to step forward now, why wouldn't they before? Sometimes the reason for reporting evidence you have is to motivate other people to display evidence they have but don't know was interesting or useful until they saw your story. That's why so often a single public allegation leads to an avalanche of similar allegations.
- stupidbird 8y ago
  Yeah that's fair, and an avenue they should take first.
krn 8y ago
Even if Bloomberg's story is completely true, Apple / Amazon / Super Micro might have no other choice, but to firmly deny it. Because in that case, it's United States vs. China, not just some publisher vs. a few publicly traded companies. When national security interests and international relationships between two largest economies in the world are at stake, it's not Tim Cook or Jeff Bezos, who get to decide, what can be publicly shared, and what cannot.
- foxX 8y ago
  > it's not Tim Cook or Jeff Bezos, who get to decide But who is, John Doe who dies on a grenade?
  - krn 8y ago
    The national security adviser to the president of the United States is the one, who would have to deal with this publicly, if such information was confirmed by some of largest companies in the US. And he might as well prefer to deal with it privately, if it was true.
- aljones 8y ago
  You're claiming they can be compelled to lie.
  - krn 8y ago
    If the story was true, only a few people in each company would have been aware of these vulnerabilities, and they might not have been allowed to talk to anyone about them by FBI. Then, even if others were informed, they would have to pretend, that they were not.
    - scarcely 8y ago
      same can be said for "bush did 911" lmao
  - garmaine 8y ago
ATsch 8y ago
I don't see why people discard the scenario where both the sources and supermicro are right, but there's been a misunderstanding. This could happen, for example, with a tabletop exercise. I know the military does these, so it's not unlikely the CIA does them too. The CIA dreamt up a scenario where a US company's hardware was compromised by China, and simulated their response for training. Since it's just an exercise, it obviously wasn't as secret, so employees would have probably not feared to talk about it loudly at e.g. lunch break. Someone overhears, it, runs to bloomberg and we have the situation we have now. Not the only scenario, but something along these lines is my theory.

afarah 8y ago

> Reliable newspapers generally don't throw around anonymous government sources Huh...

admax88q 8y ago

> At this point I wonder if they should stop protecting their sources on this story and see if that shakes out any truth. That would be a mistake. Don't just throw your sources to the wolves if you couldn't prove their story. They should press their sources for proof, or stronger evidence. If they can't find any then they should issue a retraction.

sixothree 8y ago
I would love to see a board in hand.
e12e 8y ago
You might, if you can with certainty say: oh, look, this was a propaganda op by these agents of this TLA.
crispyambulance 8y ago
The "should have" pressed the sources for hard proof, or found examples in the wild of adulterated servers before publishing the story. That ship has sailed, of course. But if what was reported was actually true the best thing that can happen now, for Bloomberg and the public, is for their sources to step forward voluntarily with proof. Admittedly, that will take a lot of courage in today's political climate, but if it's not all just bullshit, highly principled people may do it. What I would like to know is what the Bloomberg reporters expected would happen as a result of this story?? Did they think Supermicro and Apple would just admit it? Then what?
- exoesquitur 8y ago
  If this is actually a thing, it's probably 5 eyes that has the most invested in the tech. (Waves hands and puts on tinfoil hat) Check mate, atheists.
- lupire 8y ago
  If the sources are willing to step forward now, why wouldn't they before? Sometimes the reason for reporting evidence you have is to motivate other people to display evidence they have but don't know was interesting or useful until they saw your story. That's why so often a single public allegation leads to an avalanche of similar allegations.
stupidbird 8y ago
Yeah that's fair, and an avenue they should take first.

krn 8y ago

Even if Bloomberg's story is completely true, Apple / Amazon / Super Micro might have no other choice, but to firmly deny it. Because in that case, it's United States vs. China, not just some publisher vs. a few publicly traded companies. When national security interests and international relationships between two largest economies in the world are at stake, it's not Tim Cook or Jeff Bezos, who get to decide, what can be publicly shared, and what cannot.

foxX 8y ago
> it's not Tim Cook or Jeff Bezos, who get to decide But who is, John Doe who dies on a grenade?
- krn 8y ago
  The national security adviser to the president of the United States is the one, who would have to deal with this publicly, if such information was confirmed by some of largest companies in the US. And he might as well prefer to deal with it privately, if it was true.
aljones 8y ago
You're claiming they can be compelled to lie.
- krn 8y ago
  If the story was true, only a few people in each company would have been aware of these vulnerabilities, and they might not have been allowed to talk to anyone about them by FBI. Then, even if others were informed, they would have to pretend, that they were not.
  - scarcely 8y ago
    same can be said for "bush did 911" lmao
- garmaine 8y ago

ATsch 8y ago

I don't see why people discard the scenario where both the sources and supermicro are right, but there's been a misunderstanding. This could happen, for example, with a tabletop exercise. I know the military does these, so it's not unlikely the CIA does them too. The CIA dreamt up a scenario where a US company's hardware was compromised by China, and simulated their response for training. Since it's just an exercise, it obviously wasn't as secret, so employees would have probably not feared to talk about it loudly at e.g. lunch break. Someone overhears, it, runs to bloomberg and we have the situation we have now. Not the only scenario, but something along these lines is my theory.