KUALA LUMPUR, March 6 — Investment, Trade, and Industry (Miti) Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz said there are no findings or reports indicating that Nvidia artificial intelligence (AI) chips in servers were transferred to Malaysia from Singapore as claimed.
"Currently, we have commenced an investigation together with relevant agencies, including the Royal Malaysia Police, the Royal Malaysian Customs Department, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), and parties from the United States.
“At the moment, there are no findings or reports indicating that (the matter) actually exists,” he said during the question-and-answer session in the Dewan Negara today.
Tengku Zafrul was replying to Senator Rita Sarimah Anak Patrick Insol's supplementary query on the government’s actions to protect Malaysia from being used as an intermediary country or the re-exporting of AI chips or “advanced semiconductor production tools” to China which are restricted, following allegations that Nvidia chips were re-exported through Malaysia to that country.
He added that the government will continue to monitor for possible cases of fraud by companies importing servers containing unused chips, as mentioned in the request to import the goods.
“We will continue to monitor... this afternoon, Digital Minister Gobind Singh Deo and I, as co-chairs, will hold the first meeting of the Joint Data Centre Task Force,” Tengku Zafrul said.
On February 25, Miti said a Data Centre Task Force, which was approved by the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation, has been set up to discuss investment projections and key industry challenges and address issues and concerns regarding data centre expansion in Malaysia, namely energy consumption, infrastructure readiness, and challenges posed by regulations.
On Monday (March 3), it said it is investigating allegations that Nvidia AI chips in servers linked to the fraud case were moved from Singapore to Malaysia.
This came after news reports on the same day that quoted Singapore's Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam as saying that servers linked to a fraud case in the country might have contained Nvidia AI chips, which were later transferred to Malaysia.
According to news reports from Singapore, the chips were allegedly planted in servers supplied by Dell and Supermicro to Singapore-based companies before being shipped to Malaysia.
— Bernama
