Are Zen 1 based devices in danger because of AMD gave Chinese their information? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Logan
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 05, 2021, 11:00:33 am
content: So some times ago:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD–Chinese_joint_ventureWe all know Chinese government are trying to spy on people, even foreigners. And to make matters worse, China usually have a bad management for information security (look at their SSL certs), so it's possible the details may leak to hackers and being taken advantage of.However I haven't heard any security issues related to this, so can anyone tell if Zen 1 based units are safe or not?

author: BravoV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 05, 2021, 11:06:30 am
content: Just do not use it, why so difficult to decide ?Also once you used it, you will be targeted by Jewish Space Laser, it happened you know.

author: Yansi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 05, 2021, 01:14:21 pm
content: Quote from: blueskull on February 05, 2021, 11:12:17 amI am surprised you even react to this stuff. It's like a national sport in the US of A, to point fingers to China for everything, even stuff that is not related to it. Keep calm and ignore it

author: ebastler
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 05, 2021, 05:32:55 pm
content: Quote from: Logan on February 05, 2021, 11:00:33 amSince AMD, a trusted American (yeah!) manufacturer, will certainly not rely on security by obscurity, how could disclosing their design details to a 3rd party possibly create any security risk in their products?

author: newbrain
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 12, 2021, 10:50:06 am
content: Quote from: Logan (edited) on February 05, 2021, 11:00:33 amThere, FTFY

author: GodIsRealUnless DefinedInt
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 14, 2021, 02:50:37 am
content: Quote from: Logan on February 05, 2021, 11:00:33 amStorm in a teacup.If you work in Tech you know that the licensing agreements don't give the Chinese full design access but to the high level blocks, the encryption being ripped out and replaced with the equivalent Chinese encryption blocks to support Chinese schemes. The only other thing they were given the tools to replace was the I/O. As far as I know at the time the deigns was for the Global Foundries process so only GloFo could at the time manufacture them for the Chinese. It would take an awful lot of reverse engineering to get the single core they were allowed to have made for them into any form that could be meaningfully improved upon. The only thing it had equivalent performance wise to the original Zen 1 CPU was Integer performance, everything else was sub standard to the performance of the Zen 1 and they have no access to the encryption blocks in the official Zen x86 processors you and the rest of the world are running. Details in the Chinese variant can be found in the Linux source code, as Linux is used to power the world's supercomputers and that's a goal of the Chinese with their CPUs among other things to have bragging rights to a Chinese own Supercomputer rather than just buying one from a non Chinese company.Chinese multi core attempts have been horrendous as far as performance with dual 32 core Chinese servers which can handily be beaten by a single Ryzen 7 1800X. China may eventually get to performance parity but it will be through having to expend a fortune to get there, they didn't get a massive leg up from the AMD licensing as some think.

author: coppice
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 14, 2021, 02:58:08 am
content: Quote from: Yansi on February 05, 2021, 01:14:21 pmWestern countries assume China will do bad things, because they know that in similar circumstances they would. You can't trust Chinese made telecoms and security systems, just as you can't trust similar products from any other country. Governments just find it too hard to resist tampering with things.

author: BravoV
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 14, 2021, 01:03:53 pm
content: How can this thread turn into a serious technical discussion ? When the OP clearly stated that everything & anything China is evil and bad.

author: S. Petrukhin
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 15, 2021, 09:50:35 am
content: Russian hackers were offended and bored, and everyone forgot about them...We're used to being bad, but the Chinese guys are ahead of us now.It seems to me that the main danger in the modern World is the TV and the chatter of politicians.

author: Haenk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 18, 2021, 01:15:21 pm
content: If you trust US-technology not to be bugged - fair enough, just buy "Made in USA".(Why is there no button to downvote threads?)

author: Logan
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2021, 12:19:15 pm
content: Quote from: Haenk on February 18, 2021, 01:15:21 pmTo annoy people like you