When you hear of smuggling you don’t typically think of PC hardware, but it does happen. We’ve seen people strap both CPUs and M.2 drives to their body to finesse customs authorities. This time Chinese Customs seized 780 Intel processors worth $137,000 at the Gongbei Port connecting Macau and Zhuhai in China.
Smugglers had tried to hide these CPUs inside the engine of a cross-border bus. This does seem like a better idea than of course strapping the CPUs to your body, but customs offers noticed something odd about the bus from the digital imagery. When they inspected the engine they discovered a modification to conceal smuggled good, in this case it was 780 Intel processors.
Initial estimates of the bust put the total value of the chips at over one million Yuan, which is equivalent to $137,341. The picture provided by Chinese customs doesn’t allow us to see which exact chips these are, but they appear to be either 12th generation Alder Lake or 13th generation Raptor Lake chips.
Via Tom’s Hardware
