The biggest heist of the US-China Chip War: 3 Supermicro employees charged with conspiracy to smuggle restricted Nvidia H100, H200, and B200 chips to China dummy boxes, fake labels, and a pass-through company enabled the $2.5 billion scheme

Date:
Fri, 20 Mar 2026 16:39:57 +0000

Description:
Three men are facing charges of conspiracy to smuggle restricted GPUs to China.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Tech Radar Get the TechRadar Newsletter Sign up for
breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. You are
now subscribed Your newsletter sign-up was successful An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter Three men have been charged for exporting restricted AI chips to China The
men were employees of Super Micro Computer Inc. The scheme amassed $2.5 billion in sales, circumventing restrictions on power AI GPUs A federal investigation has been launched after the US Department of Justice charged three individuals for allegedly smuggling restricted Nvidia AI chips to
China.

The three men were not named in court documents , however a statement
released by Super Micro Computer Inc. identified those involved. The
smuggling allegedly occurred between 2024 and 2025, with billions of dollars worth of computer servers containing advanced Nvidia making the journey to China. Article continues below You may like Anthropic CEO goes nuclear on Nvidia at Davos over China chip sales 'I do think we always have to think about, maybe even worry a little bit about, Chinese subsidies': Microsoft President says US firms should get ready for more competition from China High-end PC gaming is in big trouble, thanks to AI and RTX 5090 price hikes are prime examples The masterminds behind the $2.5 billion scheme Of the
three men charged, two have been arrested. Yih-Shyan Wally Liaw, a senior
vice president and board member of Supermicro, was arrested in California, while Ting-Wei Willy Sun, a Supermicro contractor based in Taiwan, was also taken into custody. The third man, Ruei-Tsang Steven Chang, worked for Supermicros Taiwan office and is currently a fugitive.

Supermicro issued a statement on the arrest of the three men. The conduct by these individuals alleged in the indictment is a contravention of the
Companys policies and compliance controls, including efforts to circumvent applicable export control laws and regulations, the company said. Supermicro maintains a robust compliance program and is committed to full adherence to all applicable U.S. export and re-export control laws and regulations.

The smuggling scheme allegedly amassed $2.5 billion in sales, with the trio managing to divert over $510 million worth of Supermicro servers to China.
The servers were allegedly ordered by a Southeast Asian pass-through company (noted in the indictment as Company-1) in order to appear as legitimate transactions, before being repackaged and shipped to China. Supplying China with cutting edge tech The Supermicro servers largely contained Nvidia H100 and H200 Tensor Core GPUs, which are specifically designed to train and
handle large language models (LLMs). Are you a pro? Subscribe to our newsletter Sign up to the TechRadar Pro newsletter to get all the top news, opinion, features and guidance your business needs to succeed! Contact me
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The indictment further states that in order to keep China supplied with the latest technologies, Liaw allegedly pushed for Company-1 to place larger orders, including servers containing Nvidias B200 - one of the most advanced GPUs at the time. The height of the US-China Chip War The US has had restrictions on the types of GPUs companies are allowed to export to China since October 2022. The primary purpose of these restrictions was to maintain US superiority in AI development, while simultaneously preventing China from building powerful models that could be used for decryption, autonomous
weapons systems, and cyberwarfare.

In order to police the enforcement of these restrictions, physical
inspections took place to ensure servers werent being smuggled into China. However, the three individuals allegedly organized staged dummy servers packaged with Supermicros labels and boxes, while the original contents of those same boxes were already being shipped to China. What to read next Key Apple, Nvidia, and Tesla supplier sees confidential files allegedly exposed
in major breach - here's what we know so far Could an Nvidia chip power your next laptop? Existing powerhouses could face the might of AI giant coming to
a PC near you soon Malicious Microsoft VSCode AI extensions might have hit over 1.5 million users Circumventing the restrictions As this case would attest, export restrictions are only as good as their physical inspections. While the indictment doesnt explain the process of a physical inspection, it does state that an audit took place in August of 2025. However, the
indictment further states that the individual tasked with conducting the
audit was allegedly off-site enjoying entertainment paid for by Company-1.

In order to complete the audit, Sun allegedly sent photos and videos of the dummy servers, complete with their fake labels, to the auditor. The US Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) later informed Supermicro that Company-1 was diverting its orders to China, and a second audit was scheduled. The second audit again involved dummy servers, and resulted in BIS placing a hold on Company-1s shipments.

Since January 2026, the restrictions on the export of H200 chips to China has been lifted , but there are requirements that customers ensure sufficient security procedures, with approved exports being subjected to a 25% tax. However, B200 chips remain strictly banned. The best antivirus for all
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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/pro/security/the-biggest-heist-of-the-us-china-chip- war-3-supermicro-employees-charged-with-conspiracy-to-smuggle-restricted-nvidi a-h100-h200-and-b200-chips-to-china-dummy-boxes-fake-labels-and-a-pass-through -company-enabled-the-usd2-5-billion-scheme


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