(Reuters) -Chinese authorities have urged local companies to avoid using Nvidia’s H20 processors, particularly for government-related purposes, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.
Authorities have sent notices to a range of firms discouraging use of the less-advanced semiconductors, with the guidance taking a particularly strong stance against the use of Nvidia’s H20s for any government or national security-related work by state enterprises or private companies, the report said.
Reuters could not immediately confirm the report. Nvidia did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside regular business hours.
Nvidia said in July that its products have no “backdoors” that would allow remote access or control after China raised concerns over potential security risks in the firm’s H20 artificial intelligence chip.
U.S. President Donald Trump suggested on Monday that he might allow Nvidia to sell a scaled-down version of its next-generation advanced GPU chip in China, despite deep-seated fears in Washington that China could harness U.S. artificial intelligence capabilities to supercharge its military.
The move could open the door to China securing more advanced computing power from the U.S. even as the two countries battled for technology supremacy, critics said.
(Reporting by Ananya Palyekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Tom Hogue and Kim Coghill)
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