Posts

DeepSeek, a rising CCP AI company, was under siege. The company’s official statement, issued in careful, bureaucratic phrasing, spoke of an orchestrated “distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack” aimed at crippling its systems. A grave and urgent matter, to be sure. Yet, for those who had followed the firm’s meteoric rise, there was reason for skepticism

DeepSeek had, until this moment, presented itself as a leader in artificial intelligence, one of the few entities capable of standing alongside Western firms in the increasingly cutthroat race for dominance in machine learning. It was a firm backed, either openly or in whispered speculation, by the unseen hand of the Chinese state. The company’s servers, housed in mainland China, were reportedly fueled by NVIDIA H800 GPUs, their interconnections optimized through NVLink and InfiniBand. A formidable setup, at least on paper

But then came the curious measures. Whole swaths of IP addresses, particularly from the United States, were unceremoniously blocked. The platform’s registration doors were slammed shut. And in the vague, elliptical style of official Chinese pronouncements, the public was assured that these were emergency steps to preserve service stability. What the company did not say—what they could not say—was that these actions bore all the hallmarks of a hasty retreat, rather than a tactical defense

For a true DDoS attack—one launched by sophisticated adversaries—there were measures to mitigate it. Content delivery networks. Traffic filtering. Rate-limiting techniques refined over decades by those who had fought in the trenches of cybersecurity. Yet DeepSeek’s response was not one of resilience, but of restriction. They were not filtering the bad actors; they were sealing themselves off from the world

A theory began to take shape among industry watchers. If DeepSeek had overestimated its own technological prowess, if its infrastructure was ill-prepared for rapid growth, the sudden influx of new users might have looked, to their own internal systems, like an attack. And if the company was not merely a commercial enterprise but an entity with deeper ties—perhaps to sectors of the Chinese government—it would not do to admit such failings publicly. To confess that their AI could not scale, that their systems could not bear the weight of global interest, would be an unpardonable humiliation.

The consequences of such a revelation would be severe. The markets had already felt the tremors of cyberattacks; the global economy had bled $1.5 trillion due to disruptions of this nature. If DeepSeek, a firm hailed as the vanguard of China’s AI ambitions, was faltering under its own weight, the financial and political repercussions would extend far beyond the walls of its server farms. The illusion of invulnerability had to be maintained

Thus, the narrative of a “DDoS attack” was not merely convenient—it was necessary. It allowed DeepSeek to take drastic action while obscuring the truth. Blocking foreign IPs? A countermeasure against cyber threats. Suspending new users? A precaution against infiltration. A firm whose technological backbone was more fragile than its reputation suggested had suddenly found an excuse to withdraw from scrutiny under the guise of self-defense

It is in such moments that history leaves its telltale fingerprints. The annals of technological development are filled with entities that stumbled not due to sabotage, but due to their own shortcomings, concealed under layers of propaganda and misdirection. One wonders if, years from now, when the documents are unsealed and the real story emerges, historians will look back at DeepSeek’s so-called DDoS crisis not as an act of foreign aggression—but as a moment of revelation, when the cracks in the edifice became too great to hide

Also, the DeepSeek app has been removed from both Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store in Italy. This action occurred after Italy’s data protection authority, known as the Garante, requested information from DeepSeek regarding its handling of personal data. Users attempting to access the app in Italy received messages indicating that it was “currently not available in the country or area you are in” on Apple’s App Store and that the download “was not supported” on Google’s platform. As reported by REUTERS.CO

Regarding Ireland, the Irish Data Protection Commission has also reached out to DeepSeek, seeking details about how it processes data related to Irish users. However, as of now, there is no confirmation that the app has been removed from app stores in Ireland. As reported by THEGUARDIAN.COM

Currently there is no publicly available information indicating that DeepSeek has specifically blocked access from Apple, Google, or individual reporters’ servers. It’s possible that access issues could be related to the broader measures DeepSeek has implemented in response to recent events, but without specific details, it’s difficult to determine the exact cause.

For now, the truth remains elusive, hidden behind digital firewalls and the careful hand of censorship. But as in all such cases, history is patient. It waits for those who will dig deeper, who will look beyond the official statements and ask: Was it an attack? Or was it something else entirely?

Story By Skeeter Wesinger

January 30, 2025

 

Nvidia, headquartered in Santa Clara, California, has emerged as a beacon of technological innovation, much as the industrial giants of a bygone era reshaped their worlds. Its latest creations—the Hopper GPU and Blackwell systems—are not merely advancements in computing; they are the tools of a new industrial revolution, their influence stretching across industries and into the lives of millions. As measured by its astonishing financial results, the company’s trajectory reflects the unparalleled demand for these tools.

The latest quarter’s revenue, a staggering $35.08 billion, represents a 94% leap from the $18.12 billion of a year prior—a figure that would have seemed fantastical not long ago. Its net income soared to $19.31 billion, more than double last year’s third-quarter figure of $9.24 billion. Even after accounting for adjustments, earnings reached 81 cents per share, outpacing Wall Street’s expectations of 75 cents per share on projected revenues of $33.17 billion, according to FactSet.

This is no mere coincidence of market forces or transient trends. Nvidia’s success is rooted in the astonishing versatility of its Hopper GPU and Blackwell systems. Their applications span a broad spectrum—from artificial intelligence to cybersecurity—each deployment, which is a testament to their transformative power. These are not simply tools but harbingers of a future where the limits of what machines can do are redrawn with each passing quarter.

The Hopper and Blackwell systems are not isolated achievements; they are central to Nvidia’s rise as a leader in innovation, its vision ever fixed on the horizon. The technology reshapes industries as varied as medicine, entertainment, finance, and autonomous systems, weaving a thread of progress through all it touches. Like the significant advancements of earlier eras, these creations do not merely answer existing questions; they pose new ones, unlocking doors to realms previously unimagined.

Thus, Nvidia’s record-breaking quarter is a financial milestone and a marker of its place in history. As it shapes the future of computing, the company’s influence extends far beyond the confines of Silicon Valley. It is, in a sense, a reflection of our age—a testament to human ingenuity and the ceaseless drive to innovate, explore, and create.

By Skeeter Wesinger

November 20, 2024

In the age of relentless digital transformation, software security remains both a bulwark and a vulnerability. The deployment of Large Language Models (LLMs) as tools to fortify this critical frontier marks a turning point, one that evokes the blend of promise and peril characteristic of technological revolutions. Like radar in the skies of the Second World War, these LLMs have the potential to detect threats unseen by the human eye, provided they are used judiciously and in concert with other defenses.

The power of LLMs lies in their unparalleled ability to analyze vast swaths of source code with a speed and thoroughness that human developers cannot match. From detecting the cracks in the foundation—buffer overflows, injection vulnerabilities, hardcoded credentials, and improper input validation—to recognizing subtle, non-obvious threats that arise from the interplay of complex systems, these models operate with an unrelenting vigilance. What might take a team of skilled engineers days or weeks to unearth, an LLM can flag in minutes, scouring line after line with mechanical precision.

This capability is most potent during the prerelease phase of development when the entire source code is laid bare. It is here, before a product sees the light of day, that LLMs can expose vulnerabilities lurking in the shadows, vulnerabilities that, if left unchecked, could later metastasize into full-blown breaches. The cost of such breaches is not merely financial but reputational, eroding the trust that underpins all digital enterprises.

Consider the subtle artistry of an LLM detecting insecure data handling in a function, not because the code itself appears flawed but because of the way it interacts with calls elsewhere in the codebase. This is no brute-force analysis; it is an exercise in pattern recognition, a demonstration of how machines are learning to see the forest as well as the trees.

Yet, as with radar, the promise of LLMs must be tempered by realism. They are not a standalone defense, nor do they obviate the need for more traditional measures. They complement fuzzing, which tests software by bombarding it with random inputs and identifying areas where such testing might be most fruitful. They serve as a first line of defense, flagging issues for human reviewers who can then apply their judgment and experience to resolve them.

Moreover, LLMs can act as vigilant assistants during development itself, offering real-time suggestions for secure coding practices. In doing so, they become not merely tools of analysis but instruments of prevention, guiding developers away from insecure practices before they become embedded in the code.

What sets LLMs apart is their scalability. Unlike manual reviews, which are labor-intensive and constrained by human resources, LLMs can analyze sprawling codebases or even multiple projects simultaneously. This scalability is nothing short of transformative for organizations tasked with securing complex software ecosystems.

Used in concert with fuzzing, manual reviews, and other security protocols, LLMs represent the new frontline in software security. They bring automation and scale to an arena that has long been constrained by the limitations of time and manpower. Their ability to access and analyze full source code during development ensures that the vulnerabilities they uncover are not only flagged but actionable.

The lessons of history remind us that no single technology, no matter how transformative, can operate in isolation. LLMs are tools of immense potential, but it is the interplay of man and machine, of automation and expertise, that will ultimately determine their success. In this emerging battle for the sanctity of our digital infrastructures, LLMs are an ally of immense promise, provided we deploy them wisely and with an understanding of their limitations.

By Skeeter Wesinger

November 18, 2024

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/new-frontline-security-technology-skeeter-wesinger-olzbe