Curiosities in the Far East: smugglers caught with ancient CPUs
A 51-year-old wanted to smuggle 596 Intel Xeon processors out of Hong Kong. The market value is said to be surprisingly high.
Hong Kong customs regularly find smuggled hardware. In the most recent case, hundreds of Intel processors were seized.
(Image: customs.gov.hk)
For some, it's hardware scrap, for others it's a ticket to riches: reports from Hong Kong customs reveal occasionally which processors are still in demand in China. In the most recent case, the Hong Kong customs authority seized 596 Xeon processors from Intel.
According to an official statement, a 51-year-old man was attempting to export them from Hong Kong through the Shenzhen Bay checkpoint by car. The initial suspicion of smuggling arose from an X-ray scan of the car.
(Image: customs.gov.hk)
Seven-year-old CPUs
A photo taken by customs shows Xeon Gold processors whose model number apparently begins with 61. These would be CPUs from the Skylake generation, still using 14-nanometer technology, which were released in 2017. The arrangement of the contact surfaces and SMD components on the backs of the processors also matches this. The fastest model in this series is the Xeon Gold 6152 with 22 CPU cores and a maximum clock frequency of 3.7 GHz. With a thermal design power (TDP) of up to 200 watts, the processors are very inefficient by today's standards.
AMD, Intel and other suppliers of ARM processors have only been allowed to supply many Chinese companies with special licenses from the US government for years. The USA wants to prevent China from setting up large data centers for training AI models, for example. This is why the black and gray markets for server-compatible hardware are so pronounced in China. Further smuggling towards Russia cannot be ruled out either.
Market value in the millions according to customs
Nevertheless, the estimated market value of the processors that have now been discovered seems high: Hong Kong customs speak of around 12 million US dollars (11.2 million euros). That would be around 20,000 dollars per processor.
For comparison: the currently most expensive Intel CPU, the 64-core Xeon Platinum 8592+ (Xeon Scalable Gen 5 alias Emerald Rapids), has a recommended retail price of 11,600 dollars. The Xeon 6780E with 144 efficiency cores officially costs 11,350 dollars. Models such as the Xeon Gold 6152 are available in Germany for around 200 euros.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong is imposing fines of up to two million dollars for importing and exporting duty-unpaid goods. Prison sentences of up to seven years are also possible. No verdict has yet been reached in the current case.
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