The Biden administration is set to announce new measures to limit Chinese companies’ access to technology that enables high-performance computing, people familiar with the matter said. Automate large-scale surveillance systems.
The measures, which could be announced as early as this week, would be some of the most significant steps the Biden administration has taken to cut off access to China’s advanced semiconductor technology. They are based on Trump-era rules that hit Chinese telecoms giant Huawei by banning companies around the world from sending products made using American technology, machinery, or software. is built with
Many Chinese companies, government labs and other entities are expected to face similar restrictions to Huawei, according to two people familiar with the plan. In effect, companies using American-made technology will be blocked from selling to Chinese companies targeted by the regime. It is not yet clear which Chinese companies and research institutions will be affected.
Widespread expansion of what is known as the Foreign Direct Products Rule is just one of the restrictions Washington is planning. The administration is also expected to try to control the sale of cutting-edge U.S.-made tools to domestic semiconductor makers in China.
Washington also plans to limit the sale of US-made microchips to China’s most powerful supercomputing and data center projects, the official said. It could hamper the ability of major academic institutions and internet companies such as Tencent to obtain the parts needed to build major data centers and supercomputers.
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Over time, as the performance level of supercomputers rises, the upper limit will limit China’s ability to develop powerful computational technologies that form the building blocks of innovations across fields such as bioscience, artificial intelligence, and missile engineering. can seriously interfere. Curve-on-chip and chip-making tools Reuters previously reported.
Administration officials are also considering other measures that could be applied to Chinese memory chip maker Yangtze Memory Technologies Company (YMTC), people familiar with the discussions said.
The White House declined to comment on planned restrictions.A spokeswoman for the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security, which has authority over the types of technology companies can export outside the United States, said nothing could be confirmed at this time. rice field.
If enacted, the move would be the strongest push yet by the United States to hit China’s thriving supercomputer and data center market. Many Chinese universities, state-owned enterprises and Internet companies operate supercomputers with various functions. While many are used for mundane but important tasks such as analyzing road traffic, managing social networks, and forecasting the weather, analysts and researchers are wondering how others serve more nefarious purposes. It shows how it is used.
China is using some supercomputers to power an invasive surveillance system targeting ethnic minorities. Others are used by Beijing to model nuclear explosions and design next-generation weapons that can evade American defenses.
For example, in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region in western China, hundreds of thousands of Uyghur ethnic minorities are being detained and monitored. Supercomputers built with chips from Intel and Nvidia are used to process footage collected from video cameras ubiquitous in the region. Both Intel and Nvidia say they are unaware of what they call misuse of their technology.
The US government has tried in recent years to curb the flow of technology to such projects, but the widespread availability of powerful microchips has foiled those efforts.
Because many of the products sold to China are manufactured outside the United States, the traditional U.S. government regulatory methods that focus on products exported from the United States do not apply. That is why officials in the Trump and Biden administrations have called for Foreign Direct Products, a blanket regulation that prevents products manufactured around the world with the help of U.S. technology, machinery, or software from being sold to China. Now take advantage of the rules. Even semiconductors made in other countries are often manufactured using US equipment and software. ”
The Biden administration has faced criticism for being slow to limit China’s access to cutting-edge US technology. For many administration officials, China’s recent progress in clearing key technological hurdles in semiconductor manufacturing has underscored the urgent need for broader regulation in the industry, people familiar with the discussion said.
Export controls are part of the Biden administration’s larger strategy to drain key technologies from China while pumping money into U.S. semiconductor factories. The move comes as Beijing ramps up its attacks on Taiwan, which produces nearly all of the world’s advanced semiconductors.
Speaking at the White House last month, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said: Said The US government used to try to stay several generations ahead of its competitors in certain key technologies, but its approach was no longer rigorous enough.
“Given the fundamental nature of certain technologies, such as advanced logic and memory chips, we need to maintain as large a lead as possible,” he said.
The Biden administration has said it will in the long run cripple Russia’s defense, technology, energy and other vital sectors, and has used extensive export controls as a powerful tool to punish Russia for aggression against Ukraine. US officials say the same tools can be applied to other rival states, particularly China, to address national security challenges. Officials say the Trump administration’s use of export controls to thwart Huawei served as a model for how to formulate restrictions on Russian companies.
Last month, the Biden administration imposed new restrictions on the sale of some advanced computer chips to China and Russia. It focused on the high-end model of the chip known as the . Made to render images in video games, these products have become important for large computers used to train artificial intelligence algorithms.
Paul Triolo, senior vice president of China for strategy firm Albright Stonebridge Group, said the move was “probably the strongest regulation and export control the U.S. government has ever put in place regarding China’s access to U.S. technology. It’s a statement,” he said. It comes at a sensitive time for China’s leaders ahead of the Communist Party’s 20th National Congress meeting beginning Oct. 16.
“The administration is stepping in here,” he said.