32 Nvidia B300 GPUs Detected in China Telecom Infrastructure

Israeli security company Lava announced on Thursday that it detected 32 Nvidia Blackwell Ultra B300 processors operating within the network of China Telecom. The state-owned telecommunications provider hosts these advanced AI chips despite U.S. export controls that generally bar sales to the country. The discovery, first reported by The Information, adds to a growing list of incidents involving restricted hardware reaching Chinese data centers.

Current regulations allow the sale of this chip class only to whitelisted buyers who agree not to resell to sanctioned parties. Enforcement has proven challenging, with a 2025 report estimating that $1 billion in Nvidia AI chips was smuggled into China over a three-month period. While B200 processors were the primary target at that time, distributors were already positioning to handle the newer B300 series.

Nvidia acknowledged the findings but characterized the impact as minor. A spokesperson stated that recent court cases show an "insignificant diversion of controlled US products," estimating the loss at less than half of one percent of total shipments. The company noted that with tens of millions of GPUs already in service in approved countries, the report suggests smuggling remains a "nonfactor" blocked by governments on both sides.

The specific pathway for these chips remains unclear, and Lava has not determined their exact location within China Telecom's infrastructure. The firm identified the hardware using Nvidia's DCGM Exporter, a monitoring tool intended for internal server health checks. This software can sometimes be accessed from outside the data center network without a password. Nvidia confirmed it is developing a dedicated tool to locate its chips, though the software has not yet been released.

The B300 offers 50% more memory and FP4 compute capability than the previous B200 model. Nvidia announced the chip in March 2025, marketing it for advanced large language models like DeepSeek R1. The processor was expected to ship by the end of 2025 and quickly became a high-demand item in the market.

Legal actions have followed recent smuggling allegations. In August 2026, nine individuals in Taiwan were indicted for illegally exporting B300 GPUs to China. These indictments came shortly after Supermicro fired several employees following an internal investigation. The scheme involved a Taiwanese server trading firm named Flying Tiget Tech, which held whitelisted status for GPU purchases.

High demand for Nvidia silicon has driven up prices for older hardware, with servers built around the A100 GPU tripling in value. Amid the crackdown on smuggling, some buyers have reportedly retooled gaming GPUs to handle AI workloads as an alternative to restricted data center chips.