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If they had a case, it would have been against the Chinese manufacturers of the copycat chips, or against product manufacturers who (often inadvertently) used t

by ohazi 5y ago

If they had a case, it would have been against the Chinese manufacturers of the copycat chips, or against product manufacturers who (often inadvertently) used the mislabeled, fraudulently sold chips in designs that called for real FTDI chips. If suing a Chinese company is hard, they could have also worked with law enforcement to conduct the same sort of "find and destroy inventory" sting operations that the police sometimes do for counterfeit handbags. Instead they went rogue and did the equivalent of personally barging into everybody's home and shooting up their appliances. What if they had bricked life support equipment, or part of an airliner? It was so unbelievably reckless -- I don't understand how any of their lawyers could have possibly signed off on such a stunt. They should have been sued into oblivion for it.

buran77 5y ago
> What if they had bricked life support equipment, or part of an airliner While I agree that was a bad strategy, even more so from a PR standpoint, I'd like to believe critical industries like medical electronics or avionics would do a better job not only validating components (even at the individual level) but also subsequent software updates. Electronics are less a wear part than mechanical parts where counterfeits have an easier time sneaking in (the occasional counterfeit screw let's say). Any scenario involving any kind of failure looks more dire when you attach it to "life support", "airplane", or "nuclear facility".
- maztaim 5y ago
  Don’t believe that, please. Medical equipment used for ventilation and sleep apnea contain foam that blows carcinogenic fumes and bits of carcinogenic foam directly into your lungs: https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/e/sleep/communications/src-update https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/e/sleep/communication...
  - buran77 5y ago
    That's a bad failure for sure but it's a very different kind. Checking for counterfeit parts is a supply chain issue, you know what you're looking for (the original part is very well described) and you check for specific markers. Design flaws are different. You can fail using an original part because you picked the wrong one for the job. Validating something for (long term) use is far trickier than checking an already validated part for a set of markers. The higher the stakes, the better the checks should be. An airplane should get better validation than a portable blood pressure monitor. Imagine something more relatable: picking the perfect person for the job is far harder than verifying that the person you chose is the one coming into the office each day.

by ohazi 5y ago

buran77 5y ago

> What if they had bricked life support equipment, or part of an airliner While I agree that was a bad strategy, even more so from a PR standpoint, I'd like to believe critical industries like medical electronics or avionics would do a better job not only validating components (even at the individual level) but also subsequent software updates. Electronics are less a wear part than mechanical parts where counterfeits have an easier time sneaking in (the occasional counterfeit screw let's say). Any scenario involving any kind of failure looks more dire when you attach it to "life support", "airplane", or "nuclear facility".

maztaim 5y ago
Don’t believe that, please. Medical equipment used for ventilation and sleep apnea contain foam that blows carcinogenic fumes and bits of carcinogenic foam directly into your lungs: https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/e/sleep/communications/src-update https://www.usa.philips.com/healthcare/e/sleep/communication...
- buran77 5y ago
  That's a bad failure for sure but it's a very different kind. Checking for counterfeit parts is a supply chain issue, you know what you're looking for (the original part is very well described) and you check for specific markers. Design flaws are different. You can fail using an original part because you picked the wrong one for the job. Validating something for (long term) use is far trickier than checking an already validated part for a set of markers. The higher the stakes, the better the checks should be. An airplane should get better validation than a portable blood pressure monitor. Imagine something more relatable: picking the perfect person for the job is far harder than verifying that the person you chose is the one coming into the office each day.