On a more on a serious note, imagine who the ME (Management Engine) of this CPU reports to and you'll think Intel CPUs are far more interesting choices.
A common argument for this goes that it's better that the Chinese government sees what you're doing than that the CIA sees what you're doing, because the CIA can break down your door or get you fired (or get other government agencies to break down your door or get other government agencies to get you fired or whatever), but the Chinese government can't really do any of that unless you travel to China (or a close ally).
But that's not really what anyone is seriously alleging about IME. Rather, the concerns people raise are about security vulnerabilities in the firmware allowing taking control of your computer, perhaps even from the network. Security vulnerabilities don't care who is exploiting them - Chinese intelligence, the CIA, the FBI, organized crime, your coworker who wants to get you fired, etc. If this processor has an IME equivalent, it will also be exploitable by every one of these adversaries: as a user, you don't care if the vulnerable code was written by an American company or a Chinese company.
My argument was that the hackers *might* be able to compromise Intel's ME, but in China all businesses are required to give their gov any assistance they require, therefore their CPUs probably have an ME that allows the Chinese gov to spy on you without any sort of vulnerability being exploited.
> Chinese government can't really do any of that unless you travel to China
This is an incredibly ignorant take. A foreign government can use blackmail and extortion to compromise individuals in industry and government. Not only that, for political figures that government doesn't like, they can used spying to feed information to their opponents and even run their own influence operations against that candidate. More importantly, Chinese dissidents are exposed to further levers of pressure if they have any family still in China.
Oh, and don't forget North Korea's big hack of Sony, which crippled several parts of the business for weeks on end, simply because they didn't like a movie one of Sony's subsidiaries had produced.
> Some people here talk about CPU backdoors as if they were building servers for their government, instead of building a Personal Computer. It's silly.
Yeah, cuz malware/ransomware never comprises the PCs of small businesses or home users. So, no need to worry! Just destroy your own credit and you won't have to worry about identity thieves, either.
They are pretty hard to acquire by end users and consumers in the West. The KX5000 wasn't legitimately reviewed for months after its release by Russian blogs. Which brings me to the obvious elephant in the room: with current global sanctions on Russia, this chip will be incredibly popular to them as they can't really get anything else.
The article is silent about this, but did this Chinese company bother to license the x86 architecture from Intel, or is this just another round of theft from the league leaders?
"Another interesting detail about Zhaoxin's KX-7000 processors is that the company says they're using a chiplet architecture, which resembles that of AMD Ryzen's processors."
Seems to be the current trend in "gluing" everything together.
The sanctions war seems to be having the predictable effect. Not relevant to me, but good to see Chinese homegrown CPUs becoming increasingly capable. The rest of the world's tech infrastructure should not be the mercy of the US government's whims.
This isn't their first rodeo. It's funny how everyone seems to think China had no interest in designing or building its own CPUs until the trade tariffs and sanctions started.
Here's a 28 nm CPU they launched way back in 2017:
To add further, there were various non-x86 efforts as well and developing CPU technological independence as well as OS independence has been an interest to China for some time:
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
19 Comments
Back to Article
powerarmour - Wednesday, December 13, 2023 - link
Still sounds more exciting than any Intel product this year.ballsystemlord - Wednesday, December 13, 2023 - link
Ha ha ha. That's a good one.On a more on a serious note, imagine who the ME (Management Engine) of this CPU reports to and you'll think Intel CPUs are far more interesting choices.
Lettuce - Thursday, December 14, 2023 - link
A common argument for this goes that it's better that the Chinese government sees what you're doing than that the CIA sees what you're doing, because the CIA can break down your door or get you fired (or get other government agencies to break down your door or get other government agencies to get you fired or whatever), but the Chinese government can't really do any of that unless you travel to China (or a close ally).But that's not really what anyone is seriously alleging about IME. Rather, the concerns people raise are about security vulnerabilities in the firmware allowing taking control of your computer, perhaps even from the network. Security vulnerabilities don't care who is exploiting them - Chinese intelligence, the CIA, the FBI, organized crime, your coworker who wants to get you fired, etc. If this processor has an IME equivalent, it will also be exploitable by every one of these adversaries: as a user, you don't care if the vulnerable code was written by an American company or a Chinese company.
Threska - Thursday, December 14, 2023 - link
That's why things having to do with remote management on servers is on a separate, not exposed to the internet, network.ballsystemlord - Thursday, December 14, 2023 - link
My argument was that the hackers *might* be able to compromise Intel's ME, but in China all businesses are required to give their gov any assistance they require, therefore their CPUs probably have an ME that allows the Chinese gov to spy on you without any sort of vulnerability being exploited.mode_13h - Tuesday, December 26, 2023 - link
> Chinese government can't really do any of that unless you travel to ChinaThis is an incredibly ignorant take. A foreign government can use blackmail and extortion to compromise individuals in industry and government. Not only that, for political figures that government doesn't like, they can used spying to feed information to their opponents and even run their own influence operations against that candidate. More importantly, Chinese dissidents are exposed to further levers of pressure if they have any family still in China.
Oh, and don't forget North Korea's big hack of Sony, which crippled several parts of the business for weeks on end, simply because they didn't like a movie one of Sony's subsidiaries had produced.
Wereweeb - Friday, December 15, 2023 - link
I'd happily use a Zhaoxin CPU if I lived in the U.S.Likewise, if I lived in continental China I'd happily use an Intel CPU.
Some people here talk about CPU backdoors as if they were building servers for their government, instead of building a Personal Computer. It's silly.
mode_13h - Saturday, December 16, 2023 - link
> Some people here talk about CPU backdoors as if they were building servers for their government, instead of building a Personal Computer. It's silly.Yeah, cuz malware/ransomware never comprises the PCs of small businesses or home users. So, no need to worry! Just destroy your own credit and you won't have to worry about identity thieves, either.
StevoLincolnite - Wednesday, December 13, 2023 - link
Even though Anadntech doesn't breakdowns/review/benchmark anymore.Would still love to see one of this chip.
Samus - Friday, December 15, 2023 - link
They are pretty hard to acquire by end users and consumers in the West. The KX5000 wasn't legitimately reviewed for months after its release by Russian blogs. Which brings me to the obvious elephant in the room: with current global sanctions on Russia, this chip will be incredibly popular to them as they can't really get anything else.mode_13h - Saturday, December 16, 2023 - link
Toms Hardware reviewed the 6000 generation.https://www.tomshardware.com/features/zhaoxin-kx-u...
regsEx - Wednesday, December 27, 2023 - link
"as they can't really get anything else."This isn't really true. However for governmental needs those would be more appealing
JBird7986 - Thursday, December 14, 2023 - link
The article is silent about this, but did this Chinese company bother to license the x86 architecture from Intel, or is this just another round of theft from the league leaders?anandcx - Thursday, December 14, 2023 - link
via has x86 license, this is in collaboration with Via.Samus - Friday, December 15, 2023 - link
VIA holds a license.Threska - Friday, December 15, 2023 - link
"Another interesting detail about Zhaoxin's KX-7000 processors is that the company says they're using a chiplet architecture, which resembles that of AMD Ryzen's processors."Seems to be the current trend in "gluing" everything together.
https://community.arm.com/arm-community-blogs/b/in...
blargh4 - Friday, December 15, 2023 - link
The sanctions war seems to be having the predictable effect. Not relevant to me, but good to see Chinese homegrown CPUs becoming increasingly capable. The rest of the world's tech infrastructure should not be the mercy of the US government's whims.mode_13h - Saturday, December 16, 2023 - link
This isn't their first rodeo. It's funny how everyone seems to think China had no interest in designing or building its own CPUs until the trade tariffs and sanctions started.Here's a 28 nm CPU they launched way back in 2017:
https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/zhaoxin/microarchitec...
PeachNCream - Saturday, December 16, 2023 - link
To add further, there were various non-x86 efforts as well and developing CPU technological independence as well as OS independence has been an interest to China for some time:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loongson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Flag_Linux