EETimes: Engineers arrested for selling Intel test CPUs on eBay

[Gillbot]

After reading the rest of the posts in this thread, I'm just happy that I've never even SEEN an ES chip.

:sneaky::sneaky::sneaky:

I got a review sample PIII from I think Soyo years back with a motherboard. If I recall correctly, it was more than 3 years after they asked for it all back, and I gladly complied. I think they were even surprised that I still had it.

 

[intangir]

Try quoting the penal code of a non-crazy place like Florida, North Dakota, etc.

I agree, however, that if one of us found an ES in our backyard that we would reasonably be expected to know that it belonged to intel and that we shouldn't sell in fleabay. Of course, if you just sold one ES chip one time then intel probably wouldn't bug you about it. Sell $82k worth of them, however...

It's fairly standard law that taking lost property without trying to find and notify the owner is theft. I mean, where the hell were you raised, on a pirate ship??

Florida:

705.102. Reporting lost or abandoned property

(1) Whenever any person finds any lost or abandoned property, such person shall report the description and location of the property to a law enforcement officer.

(2) The law enforcement officer taking the report shall ascertain whether the person reporting the property wishes to make a claim to it if the rightful owner cannot be identified or located. If the person does wish to make such claim, he or she shall deposit with the law enforcement agency a reasonable sum sufficient to cover the agency's cost for transportation, storage, and publication of notice. This sum shall be reimbursed to the finder by the rightful owner should he or she identify and reclaim the property.

(3) It is unlawful for any person who finds any lost or abandoned property to appropriate the same to his or her own use or to refuse to deliver the same when required.

(4) Any person who unlawfully appropriates such lost or abandoned property to his or her own use or refuses to deliver such property when required commits theft as defined in s. 812.014, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

North Dakota:

60-01-35 Finder must notify owner.

If the finder of a thing knows or suspects who is the owner, the finder must give such owner notice of the finding with reasonable diligence. If the finder fails to do so, the finder is liable in damages to the owner and has no claim to any reward offered by the owner for the recovery of the thing nor to any compensation for the finder's trouble or expenses.

Source: Civ. C. 1877, § 1065; R.C. 1895, § 4032; R.C. 1899, § 4032; R.C. 1905, § 5479; C.L. 1913, § 6041; R.C. 1943, § 60-0135.

 

[soccerballtux]

perhaps if those engineers had faster CPUs they could have hid their tracks on the ebays faster :whistling:

 

[bryanW1995]

It's fairly standard law that taking lost property without trying to find and notify the owner is theft. I mean, where the hell were you raised, on a pirate ship??

Florida:


North Dakota:

No, but I have watched Pirates of the Caribbean 47 times. And I did stay at a holiday inn express last night!

BTW, my comment was a dig at the state of California and it's looney tunes reputation, not a dig at people who want to enforce the law or even make common sense laws like "don't take it/sell it if it's not really yours".

 

[intangir]

No, but I have watched Pirates of the Caribbean 47 times. And I did stay at a holiday inn express last night!

BTW, my comment was a dig at the state of California and it's looney tunes reputation, not a dig at people who want to enforce the law or even make common sense laws like "don't take it/sell it if it's not really yours".

Ha, well then my post was aimed more at Kalessian and anyone else who thinks it's automatically ok to sell stuff you find. Apparently common sense is not so common.

And maybe I'm showing my ignorance, but I wasn't aware there was a connection between Holiday Inn and piracy!

 

[Yukmouth]

Ah, now the backpedaling starts I see.

Perhaps you didn't understand your own post?

Now you tell me what it is that you consider to be "far more profitable" while simultaneously "infinitely more destructive to the community".

Help me understand how none of what you posted was intended to imply drug trafficking, grand theft auto, arms black market, or illicit activities which have connections to funding terrorists organizations across the globe (ya know, the kinds of stuff that is "infinitely" more destructive).

I said don't put them around traisher people with trashier habits, plain as that, all that other crap came out of your own rear.

Trashing other users, let alone a mod is not allowed here. This is a tech forum, not OT.
For the numerous offensive posts you have made here, you are getting and infraction
Markfw900
Anandtech Moderator

Sorry, but I have to call you out on this post.

This is one of the dumbest posts I have ever read on AT. Love Intel (or hate them) it is absolutely not their fault that someone stole their loaned property and tried to make money from it. You cannot even make a case of ignorance here, where someone who bought an ES from ebay is now re-selling, and was busted.

These are engineers that KNOW what they are doing, and are just trying to make an extra buck.

This is no different than selling equipment stolen from your worksite, or more similarly, vendor equipment that is at your worksite. Intel provides these ES, but it extremely clear that they are not to be sold.

If anything, companies like Intel or AMD should be applauded for busting these types of operations because they are ultimately protecting the consumer from purchasing a CPU that is not properly supported. It protects both their interests (reputation, quality, and support) while ensuring that CPUs that you buy, regardless of where, are legimate retail CPUs meant for standard users.

It's their product, their fault, and their responsibility. Not the judicial system. That's fine these guys went down I understand they were very stupid in the way the stole, still, they accomplished it repeatedly without reprimand which is where I think Intel should be held more accountable. They could have handled this themselves but they chose not to, I don't respect that.

Hey look, an internet tough guy! You're the one that needs to get over yourself, and should be disgusted for admitting you'd deliberate shooting someone just because you had a gun.

I guess that's true if you ignore the amicable side of that 50/50 chance. Just a means to get IDC out of his boisterous analogies.

 

[Khato]

lolololol...

Miss the days i had to KILL the cpu.... i dont see those days anymore tho..

I have fond memories of destroying dozens of Merceds. Most met the ball-peen hammer while a few were deconstructed with a soldering iron. The integrated vapor chamber on the packaging was quite interesting, as were the 4 1MB L3 cache die.

 

[TuxDave]

Ah.... nvm, I don't like getting involved with this stuff...

 

[Idontcare]

I said don't put them around traisher people with trashier habits, plain as that, all that other crap came out of your own rear.

No, no you didn't.

Again, allow me to assist you in re-reading your own post:

What boggles my mind is that they actually went to jail, where they'll surely be learning how to sell stuff that's far more profitable and infinitely more destructive to the community. How about you be a responsible company, digitally mark the chips you send out, buy some of the ebay items yourself for tracking purposes and stop sending chips to companies who don't care about your policy? I don't see how creating convicts out of them is helpful to anyone.

Now you tell me what it is that you consider to be "far more profitable" while simultaneously "infinitely more destructive to the community".

Those are your words, not mine. Stop backpedaling.

 

[Yukmouth]

Criminals also sell lies, stories, black market items, service's ect. There are far more sadistic games taught in prision/jail than dealing which will in turn make these men even more of a burden to themselves AND society. Stop telling me what I mean and don't mean, more importantly don't ever assciate me with guns or drugs again, I never said GUNS AND DRUGS, that was all you.

 

[Gillbot]

I said don't put them around traisher people with trashier habits, plain as that, all that other crap came out of your own rear.



It's their product, their fault, and their responsibility. Not the judicial system. That's fine these guys went down I understand they were very stupid in the way the stole, still, they accomplished it repeatedly without reprimand which is where I think Intel should be held more accountable. They could have handled this themselves but they chose not to, I don't respect that.



I guess that's true if you ignore the amicable side of that 50/50 chance. Just a means to get IDC out of his boisterous analogies.

That's the same as saying car makers are responsible for carjacking thefts.

 

[Red Squirrel]

What they did was wrong, but I really don't think the law should even be involved. They should be fired and that's it.

If I ran a mom and pop shop and I made popsicles, and one of my employees found one of my new molds and started making the "new" types that I have not released yet, and starts selling them, the police would laugh at me when I tell them. They are breaking company policy, not the law. It's my responsibility to discipline this employee.

That said, I'm gonna hit up ebay. j/k. They've probably all been pulled and any one still there are probably "fakes".

 

[Markfw]

Guys, there is a lot of non-technical stuff here, and many insults. While infractions have been given, this thread is an "infraction magnet" and really belongs in OT. Any more of this, and I am locking this thread.
Markfw900
Anandtech Moderator.

 

[soccerballtux]

Would not surprise me at all if Intel and/or the feds were letting the ES's "walk" to find out all they can about the illegal supply chain before pulling it all down.

Law enforcement is always about more than meets the eye. Don't be naive.

interesting sounds kinda like drugs. They always forgo the small fish go in order to catch the big fish. At least, in the movies...

 

[Gillbot]

What they did was wrong, but I really don't think the law should even be involved. They should be fired and that's it.

If I ran a mom and pop shop and I made popsicles, and one of my employees found one of my new molds and started making the "new" types that I have not released yet, and starts selling them, the police would laugh at me when I tell them. They are breaking company policy, not the law. It's my responsibility to discipline this employee.

That said, I'm gonna hit up ebay. j/k. They've probably all been pulled and any one still there are probably "fakes".

Not entirely correct, if that item is trademarked or patented, the law is in fact involved.

 

[Don Karnage]

Probably the guy i bought my last ES off of. Damn.. Now where am i going to get a cheap 8 core SBE Xeon

 

[bryanW1995]

Holy crap. I just went upstairs to check on my spare cruncher. The 9600 gso in that rig was my #2 gpu cruncher for several years and only recently became the primary system gpu. I had to reboot the rig, and the 3rd line in the gpu screen that pops up before the bios says..."Engineering Sample, not for Retail Sale". I think I bought it 3 1/2 years ago on newegg. I don't even remember who the freakin' manufacturer is...

 

[ViRGE]

Holy crap. I just went upstairs to check on my spare cruncher. The 9600 gso in that rig was my #2 gpu cruncher for several years and only recently became the primary system gpu. I had to reboot the rig, and the 3rd line in the gpu screen that pops up before the bios says..."Engineering Sample, not for Retail Sale". I think I bought it 3 1/2 years ago on newegg. I don't even remember who the freakin' manufacturer is...

You can relax. That doesn't mean the card is ES, that means the manufacturer used a pre-final BIOS.

 

[exdeath]

perhaps if those engineers had faster CPUs they could have hid their tracks on the ebays faster :whistling:

Their CPU was 99% idle while they waited for the progress bar and access time trying to delete 2 million files on their slow piece of crap mechanical HDD. :awe:

Should have had a SSD array, could have wiped in 3 seconds before the police broke down the door

That's what you get for using computers that run off 8 track tapes.

 

[exdeath]

Not entirely correct, if that item is trademarked or patented, the law is in fact involved.

This. It didn't belong to you, it belonged to the company. They even have in writing signed by you that they own anything you worked on with company resources.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I know of only a couple instances of it happening but when we find these people selling ES chips we do take it very serious.

http://www.intel.com/support/processors/sb/CS-030747.htm

Aren't (weren't?) there a whole bunch of Westmere hex-core ES chips being sold on eBay with Buy-It-Now? I seem to recall seeing that as a popular option for populating eVGA SR-2s.

 

[exdeath]

Easy solution... OTP fuse register and counter in ES chips. Chip bricks itself after a determined time well past their intended use as samples. $0 black market value.

 

[Joepublic2]

Easy solution... OTP fuse register and counter in ES chips. Chip bricks itself after a determined time well past their intended use as samples. $0 black market value.

Probably wouldn't even add much complexity to the design of a modern CPU either as everything is already power gated.

 

[OS]

Easy solution... OTP fuse register and counter in ES chips. Chip bricks itself after a determined time well past their intended use as samples. $0 black market value.

nice idea but that would probably affect the layout of the chip, maybe fuse the lines coming from the pins or something instead.

 

[ArchAngel777]

No, but I have watched Pirates of the Caribbean 47 times. And I did stay at a holiday inn express last night!

BTW, my comment was a dig at the state of California and it's looney tunes reputation, not a dig at people who want to enforce the law or even make common sense laws like "don't take it/sell it if it's not really yours".

Greatest post, ever! I got a good laugh when I read that last night.

On a side note - all this bickering to some extent is splitting hairs. Some people make no distinction over taking a ball point pen, others think you can take more before it is theft. But lets be realistic here: Who has never walked away with someone else's pen? Gosh, better lock me up, I accidently walked away with a pen, or printed out a map from google maps from my work computer.

What these guys did was wrong. They took property that was not theirs and sold it. Not sure how anyone can defend that...