Bloomberg reported earlier this month that Chinese spies have compromised the technology supply chain of the U.S. by embedding malicious chips in the servers used by 30 American companies, including Apple, when they were being manufactured in China. Now, in an interview with BuzzFeed News, Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook has called for the withdrawal of the report.
Cook said in the interview:
“There is no truth in their story about Apple. They need to do that right thing and retract it."
The Bloomberg story claimed that Chinese spies managed to gain unauthorized access to the networks of Apple and Amazon, among other companies. Those networks allegedly were running on servers implanted with the spy chips. After the Cupertino giant learned about the malicious chips in 2015 it terminated its contract with supplier Supermicro and reported the incident to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.
After the story’s publication, Apple was quick to deny the claims made by the report, although this is the first time that Cook made a public request for the retraction of the story. However, Bloomberg maintained its stand on the report, saying it"s based on the accounts of government officials and insiders at the companies gathered for more than a year. The news organization also refused to provide evidence of the more than 100 interviews it claims to have conducted for the story.
Source: Buzzfeed News