Article 6RP1T Tesla, Intel, and Other EV Makers Deny Involvement in Illegal Mapping Scandal in China

Tesla, Intel, and Other EV Makers Deny Involvement in Illegal Mapping Scandal in China

by
Krishi Chowdhary
from Techreport on (#6RP1T)
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  • China recently accused an unnamed foreign firm of using its smart car project as a front for illegal map-making.
  • Naturally, this led to a lot of speculations about who this unnamed firm could be.
  • Popular companies like Tesla, Geely, Intel, and Didi had to come forward and clear their name.

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Last Wednesday, China's Ministry of State Security (MSS) accused an unnamed foreign firm of making illegal maps of the country and stealing state secrets under the disguise of a smart car project.

Naturally, fingers were pointed at some popular smart car makers in the US. So, in response to this announcement, many popular EV makers, such as Tesla, Geely, and Intel (it owns Mobileye), confirmed that they're not involved in any such activity.

What Exactly Happened?

Talking about the scandal, China's State Security Ministry put up a post on its official WeChat account and said that a foreign company, which has been described as a contractor for sensitive national projects, had apparently handed over a mapping project to a licensed Chinese company.

During this project, a bunch of sensitive information was transferred outside the state with the help of cars equipped with high-precision radar, GPS, and optical lenses.

The Ministry also said that necessary legal action has been taken against the culprit company, and the personnel responsible for this scandal have also faced legal consequences.

What Do Popular Smart Car Makers Have to Say?

Grace Tao, a VP in Tesla China took to Weibo and said Compliance is the bottom line of business operations! Tesla has always believed that compliant intelligence is sustainable intelligence."

Intel also issued a statement on Weibo last Thursday and said that they have always invested in maintaining data compliance and sticking to local regulations anywhere they work, and the same goes for China.

In fact, Intel in China works under the strict supervision of licensed entities, so there's no way the company's Mobileye could have made such a shocking legal breach.

Read more: China accuses Intel of jeopardizing its national security interests

Other EV Makers

A local carmaker called Geely was also named in the rumors. Geely has an EV brand Zeekr" that some people wrongly linked to the news. Geely's vice president and head of brand public relations, Victor Yang Xueliang, had to take a screenshot of the news clarifying that Zeekr had no involvement in the scandal.

Moreover, the company's legal department issued a separate statement criticizing the rumors. It also added that the company reserves the right to take legal action against those trying to tarnish its image.

Another popular ride-hailing service called Didi was also asked to comment on the matter by a local media outlet. It did, and has denied its involvement in the case.

Lastly, a Beijing-based autonomous driving company Navinfo also denied its involvement. Since this company is also a provider of high-precision maps, the suspicion was quite called for, but the company cleared the air and ensured that it's not involved.

The most interesting clarification came from Alibaba Cloud, which had a mapping license in China that it recently cancelled. According to the company, the cancellation was voluntary and had nothing to do with the recent scandal.

In fact, they applied for the cancellation back in April and hadn't used it in a year. This might seem suspicious, given the timing, but the Department of Natural Resources of Zhejiang also confirmed that the unnamed firm isn't Alibaba.

After clarifications by these companies, we don't have a lot of guesses left, but it's also important to note that until the culprit company officially takes responsibility or the authorities make an announcement, it will be wrong to make assumptions.

The post Tesla, Intel, and Other EV Makers Deny Involvement in Illegal Mapping Scandal in China appeared first on Techreport.

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