DeepSeek EXPOSED: US chips smuggled from…, Illegally exported to China

After DeepSeek launched its open-source AI model and chatbot, the US Commerce Department increased its monitoring, raising concerns about whether the company had access to banned chips.

Mar 5, 2025 - 01:30

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DeepSeek EXPOSED: US chips smuggled from…, Illegally exported to China

The Singapore Police Power has arrested three of us for fraud. Per stories, they had been caught illegally re-exporting Nvidia GPUs to a Chinese language AI company, DeepSeek, bypassing US commerce restrictions. This data comes from Channel News Asia. In a joint operation, police and customs officials raided 22 areas, detained 9 suspects, and seized electronic devices and documents. Reuters also reported on the incident.

Singapore turns into key hub

In 2024, Singapore became Nvidia’s 2nd-largest revenue hub, ensuing in speculation that town used to be being feeble as a gateway for smuggling GPUs into China. Nvidia denied these claims, explaining that its billing areas don’t essentially indicate where the GPUs if truth be told terminate up. The corporate also identified that shipments to Singapore accounted for lower than 2% of its complete revenue in fiscal twelve months 2025.

After DeepSeek launched its initiate-source AI mannequin and chatbot, the US Commerce Department elevated its monitoring, raising issues about whether the corporate had fetch entry to to banned chips. Reuters previously reported that despite export controls, China’s military, authorities AI labs, and universities had managed to draw restricted U.S. semiconductors.

Middlemen energetic in Singapore

Per a Channel News Asia portray, proof suggests the existence of a smuggling community. Allegedly, Singapore-based middlemen had been serving to ship high-efficiency Nvidia GPUs—feeble for AI and developed computing—to China, violating U.S. export licensed guidelines. Whereas the present arrests spotlight the role of native groups in transferring these restricted chips, authorities are quiet assessing the fat scale of the operation. As an illustration, DeepSeek depends on tens of hundreds of Nvidia Hopper GPUs (similar to H100, H20, and H800 devices) to fabricate its immense language devices. On the opposite hand, smaller learn organizations may handiest employ dozens or a complete bunch.

Closing week, the Singapore authorities clarified that it's now not obligated to place into effect unilateral foreign export restrictions. On the opposite hand, it expects firms running within its jurisdiction to conform with linked rules. Officials also emphasised that Singapore will now not tolerate misuse of its commerce blueprint to avoid global restrictions.

These arrests in Singapore came factual after the U.S. announced a month ago that it used to be investigating potential collaborations between DeepSeek and third-fetch collectively firms in Singapore to place Nvidia chips. Nvidia answered, announcing, “We employ Singapore as a hub for centralized invoicing, however our merchandise are customarily shipped elsewhere.” On the opposite hand, the U.S. Commerce Department has launched an inquiry into whether DeepSeek obtained restricted GPUs to vitality its AI explain.