America Prepares New AI Chip Restrictions to Close China’s Backdoor Access
The U.S. wants to limit China’s access to advanced AI chips, reports the Wall Street Journal, with new rules to restrict sales in parts of the world.
“The rules are aimed at China, but they threaten to create conflict between the U.S. and nations that may not want their purchases of chips micromanaged from Washington.
The latest round of curbs could come this month… Among the restrictions, the administration aims to introduce caps on shipments of AI chips to certain countries for use in large computing facilities, people familiar with the plans said. One grouping of countries — close U.S. allies — would be unrestricted, the people said, while another tier of countries would face limits on the number of chips that can go into data centers used for AI… The purchasing caps primarily apply to regions such as Southeast Asia and the Middle East, the people said…
The administration recently sent letters to major chip-makers including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing and Samsung Electronics informing them about some of the restrictions, these people said. The letters said the companies needed to apply for a license to transfer chips to China that are manufactured using advanced chip-making technology or meet other criteria. These criteria include a size and transistor-number limit as well as any indication that the chips are for use in training AI models, the people said. Previous regulations already limit the shipment of advanced GPUs and memory chips to China, but the new rules spell out more clearly to manufacturers what is banned.
U.S. officials “are also considering other options,” the article points out. “The administration is considering placing controls on exports of the so-called weights that underlie advanced AI models, according to people familiar with the matter, and weighing further China-specific restrictions on chip manufacturing.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
The U.S. wants to limit China’s access to advanced AI chips, reports the Wall Street Journal, with new rules to restrict sales in parts of the world.
“The rules are aimed at China, but they threaten to create conflict between the U.S. and nations that may not want their purchases of chips micromanaged from Washington.
The latest round of curbs could come this month… Among the restrictions, the administration aims to introduce caps on shipments of AI chips to certain countries for use in large computing facilities, people familiar with the plans said. One grouping of countries — close U.S. allies — would be unrestricted, the people said, while another tier of countries would face limits on the number of chips that can go into data centers used for AI… The purchasing caps primarily apply to regions such as Southeast Asia and the Middle East, the people said…
The administration recently sent letters to major chip-makers including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing and Samsung Electronics informing them about some of the restrictions, these people said. The letters said the companies needed to apply for a license to transfer chips to China that are manufactured using advanced chip-making technology or meet other criteria. These criteria include a size and transistor-number limit as well as any indication that the chips are for use in training AI models, the people said. Previous regulations already limit the shipment of advanced GPUs and memory chips to China, but the new rules spell out more clearly to manufacturers what is banned.
U.S. officials “are also considering other options,” the article points out. “The administration is considering placing controls on exports of the so-called weights that underlie advanced AI models, according to people familiar with the matter, and weighing further China-specific restrictions on chip manufacturing.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.