smuggler Woman tries to enter China with over 200 Intel Alder Lake CPUs hidden inside fake pregnant belly

[BiG StroOnZ]

Summary

At the Gongbei Port in Zhuhai, a Chinese woman has been caught by Chinese customs attempting to smuggle 202 Intel Alder Lake processors and 9 iPhones. The smuggler, who has only been named as Zhao by MyDrivers, was attempting to smuggle electronics into China from Macau under a fake baby bump, hoping to appear to authorities as a pregnant woman. 

 

 

 

Quotes

Quote

The perpetrator claimed she was five months pregnant; however, her belly was huge for the alleged gestation time, and she was walking effortlessly, which caused a lot of suspicions. After careful inspection, the customs agents later discovered that she had used duct tape to fix and hide smuggled goods beneath the fake silicone belly. Inside were 202 loose Alder Lake CPUs and 9 iPhones stuffed inside the false tummy, not a baby. 

 

The strangeness about this situation, aside from the obvious, is that customs would have eventually noticed the components and phones once Zhao had walked through a metal detector or full body scanners, which are safe for pregnant women to pass through these days, and which ports of entry would use instead of x-ray machines specifically for travelers who may be pregnant.

 

In any event, it is unclear why the woman was trying to bring CPUs into China from outside, and we can only speculate that it came down to their obvious resale. The value of these chips could range from $37,168 if they are all Intel Core i3 models to $164,226 if they are all Intel Core i9 models.

 

Chip smuggling is nothing new, in China and beyond. As immensely valuable electronics that are physically tiny, CPUs have the same kind of appeal as diamonds or luxury watches, maximizing potential profits per run for avoiding customs and import taxes.

 

My thoughts

This is a very interesting story, as I'm wondering how the lady thought she would get past the metal detector. Regardless, this is not the first time people have tried to smuggle tech items into China. $3 Million USD worth of AMD GPUs and 160 hidden Alder Lake CPUs were seized by Chinese customs in March. Also, $80 million USD worth of iPhones were attempted to be smuggled in by drones in China in March too. Quite the compelling operations these individuals have going on in China. The "CPU Momma" as they are calling her, will probably face jail time and heavy fines. This will likely not discourage future perpetrators from trying the same thing though. Although, this does give a whole new meaning to "Intel Inside".

 

Sources

https://overclock3d.net/news/misc_hardware/chinese_woman_attempts_to_smuggle_cpus_into_china_under_fake_baby_bump/1

https://www.tweaktown.com/news/89737/chinese-woman-fakes-pregnancy-tries-smuggling-200-intel-alder-lake-cpus/index.html

https://www.pcgamer.com/pregnant-smuggler-caught-after-200-cpus-are-found-in-her-prosthetic-belly/

https://www.pcworld.com/article/1427190/smuggler-hides-200-intel-cpus-in-a-fake-baby-bump.html

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/smuggler-hid-over-200-alder-lake-cpus-in-fake-silicone-belly

https://www.techspot.com/news/96851-woman-tries-enter-china-202-intel-cpus-hidden.html

https://hothardware.com/news/woman-caught-smuggling-cpus-in-pregnancy-prosthesis

[hndz]

I wonder what was going through her mind when she did this lmfao

[Arika]

are alder lake CPUs not sold in China? why do they need to smuggle them?

[Mark Kaine]

the funny thing is chn is probably super happy about this , free chips they probably can't get easily otherwise! 

5 minutes ago, Arika S said:

are alder lake CPUs not sold in China? why do they need to smuggle them?

without looking it up, i think not , arent there tons of tech embargoes on chn recently? 

 

 

[Forbidden Wafer]

Hahaha, fake belly reminds of a hilarious scandal. The famous grávida de Taubaté.

Spoiler

 

She went on TV shows, got a ton of donations, etc.

 

Nobody believed it could be real, but nobody thought the press would get something so fake on TV.

 

They got her live on TV, walking around, sitting and walking normally, then showing her walking upstairs to her apartment.

 

Few days later, they confirmed it was all fake.

 

A ton people stopped trusting the media on those days. 

 

 

Of course, she ended up as a meme. For example as a boss trying to bring back to life the four sons of Cthulhu. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9wJjo2_IcU&t=154

[Dukesilver27-]

42 minutes ago, Arika S said:

are alder lake CPUs not sold in China? why do they need to smuggle them?

Just checked taobao.com, plenty of alder lake CPUs being sold.

I happen to read and speak Chinese, there are tons of recent purchases.

[dizmo]

I wouldn't be surprised if that was entirely what they wanted. Chinese government gets them either way. 

[PocketNerd]

2 hours ago, BiG StroOnZ said:

-snip-

The CPUs I can understand... But IPHONES?! Is she not aware that China is WHERE THEY ARE MADE?!

[Kisai]

1 hour ago, PocketNerd said:

The CPUs I can understand... But IPHONES?! Is she not aware that China is WHERE THEY ARE MADE?!

Y'all don't realize that smuggling is rarely about "getting things into the country" and more about "getting things across the border without paying the import duties"

 

Go watch "Border Security" episodes with people from Asia trying to smuggle in things (usually counterfeit items, or failure to state they are bringing in anything valued over $10,000.) Like clockwork, you'll see someone try to smuggle in a suitcase full of (what I'm sure is counterfeit) merchandise with the tags still on it, and the border security person tells them they either have to pay the taxes on it, or destroy it in front of them.

 

Usually every case of electronics smuggling is going to be either "trying to avoid paying import taxes" or "trying to smuggle counterfeit items". Drug imports are actually illegal in nearly every country, even if the drug is legal in the country. Same with weapons. You go straight to prison if you try to import those. But if you try dodge taxes, that's usually not a prison sentence, that's a confiscation and a fine.

 

Even today, if you order things from Asia, into Canada, you're often paying around 30% in import duties. I imagine the issue is the same for HK/Mainland China and Macau/China.  Both have no import taxes except on vehicles. Import into China has a 17% VAT.

 

Not every "smuggle" story is about the product being illegal, just people trying to dodge taxes.

[Mark Kaine]

On 12/8/2022 at 5:22 AM, Dukesilver27- said:

Just checked taobao.com, plenty of alder lake CPUs being sold.

I happen to read and speak Chinese, there are tons of recent purchases.

just because they're being sold doesn't mean they entered legally.

also

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/fake-intel-cpus-counterfeit-china-processors

 

i tried looking up which chips are currently banned from being sold to china but without luck, but i definitely heard something in the news, like newer gens, probably 12th, and up, and whatever electronics gets to chn from us currently seems to need approval and is thus likely rather limited.

[leadeater]

52 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

just because they're being sold doesn't mean they entered legally.

also

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/fake-intel-cpus-counterfeit-china-processors

 

i tried looking up which chips are currently banned from being sold to china but without luck, but i definitely heard something in the news, like newer gens, probably 12th, and up, and whatever electronics gets to chn from us currently seems to need approval and is thus likely rather limited.

I know it applies to AI/HPC compute accelerators, I'm not sure about CPUs though,

 

Quote

Outside the exemptions, companies will need a special license to sell computing chips and chipmaking equipment to China. The limits specifically target  graphics processing units used to power artificial intelligence applications, as previously noted by The New York Times. 

 

[SimplyChunk]

On 12/8/2022 at 3:17 AM, hndz said:

I wonder what was going through her mind when she did this lmfao

"I'm in the Money...I'm in the Money"

[Mark Kaine]

41 minutes ago, leadeater said:

I know it applies to AI/HPC compute accelerators, I'm not sure about CPUs though

yeah, i found similar stuff, but the news said something specifically about "cpu gens" a few weeks ago. But that doesn't mean they weren't making up stuff, its the news! lol 

[leadeater]

2 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

yeah, i found similar stuff, but the news said something specifically about "cpu gens" a few weeks ago. But that doesn't mean they weren't making up stuff, its the news! lol 

 I'd likely believe Sapphire Rapids HBM/Max Series might be affected.

[mr moose]

She get caught because her wafers broke on the plane...

 

 

 

I'll see myself out.

[CTR640]

Damn, that's what I call a big abortion.

[mr moose]

19 hours ago, CTR640 said:

Damn, that's what I call a big abortion.

Intel prefers to refer to aborted silicon as celerons. 

[Shreyas1]

On 12/7/2022 at 10:47 PM, Mark Kaine said:

the funny thing is chn is probably super happy about this , free chips they probably can't get easily otherwise! 

without looking it up, i think not , arent there tons of tech embargoes on chn recently? 

 

 

I am absolutely certain that China could get their hands on a relatively small sample of CPUs if they really wanted to. I mean, if they send some people over to any other country that sells them, just buy up a few and fly back, who's going to stop them or find out?

[mr moose]

9 hours ago, Shreyas1 said:

I am absolutely certain that China could get their hands on a relatively small sample of CPUs if they really wanted to. I mean, if they send some people over to any other country that sells them, just buy up a few and fly back, who's going to stop them or find out?

Or just send them back via the post in a jar full of coal samples.   Customs don't open every container and dogs can't sniff out the difference between .5c timer circuit and 60 quizzilion transistor CPU.

[williamcll]

Have none of you considered if it's banned to be exported to China she would be arrested at the source and not the destination?

 

Also, smuggled hardware don't get taxed.

[mr moose]

20 hours ago, williamcll said:

Have none of you considered if it's banned to be exported to China she would be arrested at the source and not the destination?

 

Good point.