https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2018/11/27/bloomberg-is-still-reporting-on-challenged-story-regarding-china-hardware-hack/
By Erik Wemple
Media Critic
The Washington Post
November 27, 2018
In early October, Bloomberg Businessweek published one of the year's most
stunning tech stories. Under the headline "The Big Hack," reporters Jordan
Robertson and Michael Riley reported that China had managed to infiltrate
top U.S. companies -- including server company Super Micro (or Supermicro)
and Apple -- with a chilling hardware hack carrying implications for the
entire U.S. economy. It came under fire immediately, as government
officials and the companies themselves either denied the reporting or
claimed no familiarity with it.
In response, Bloomberg issued a statement that read, in part: "Bloomberg
Businessweek's investigation is the result of more than a year of
reporting, during which we conducted more than 100 interviews."
The company can now adjust those numbers a bit. According to informed
sources, Bloomberg has continued reporting the blockbuster story that it
broke on Oct. 4, including a very recent round of inquiries from a
Bloomberg News/Bloomberg Businessweek investigative reporter. In emails to
employees at Apple, Bloomberg's Ben Elgin has requested "discreet" input
on the alleged hack. "My colleagues' story from last month (Super Micro)
has sparked a lot of pushback," Elgin wrote on Nov. 19 to one Apple
employee. "I've been asked to join the research effort here to do more
digging on this ... and I would value hearing your thoughts (whatever they
may be) and guidance, as I get my bearings."
One person who spoke with Elgin told the Erik Wemple Blog that the
Bloomberg reporter made clear that he wasn't part of the reporting team
that produced "The Big Hack." The goal of this effort, Elgin told the
potential source, was to get to "ground truth"; if Elgin heard from 10 or
so sources that "The Big Hack" was itself a piece of hackery, he would
send that message up his chain of command. The potential source told Elgin
that the denials of "The Big Hack" were "100 percent right."
According to the potential source, Elgin also asked about the possibility
that Peter Ziatek, senior director of information security at Apple, had
written a report regarding a hardware hack affecting Apple. In an
interview with the Erik Wemple Blog, Ziatek says that he'd never written
that report, nor is he aware of such a document. Following the publication
of Bloomberg's story, Apple conducted what it calls a "secondary"
investigation surrounding its awareness of events along the lines of what
was alleged in "The Big Hack." That investigation included a full pat-down
of Ziatek's own electronic communications. It found nothing to corroborate
the claims in the Bloomberg story, according to Ziatek.
[...]
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