The U.S. Justice Department has charged two Chinese nationals, Chuan Geng and Shiwei Yang, with violating the Export Control Reform Act by allegedly shipping tens of millions of dollars’ worth of advanced Nvidia AI chips to China without the required licenses. Prosecutors say the pair used their California-based company, ALX Solutions, to send more than 20 shipments—including Nvidia H100 accelerators and GeForce RTX 4090 cards—from October 2022 through July 2025. Geng was released on a $250,000 bond, while Yang, who overstayed her visa, remains in custody pending an Aug. 12 detention hearing. Each faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Court filings cite evidence that ALX routed hardware through freight forwarders in Singapore and Malaysia and received a $1 million payment from a mainland client in early 2024. Investigators also recovered messages in which the defendants discussed using trans-shipment points to evade U.S. export controls, which have tightened steadily as Washington seeks to limit Beijing’s access to cutting-edge semiconductors. Separately, White House science adviser Michael Kratsios said the administration is exploring software or hardware location-tracking features for AI chips. The measure, outlined in July’s AI Action Plan, is intended to help regulators monitor where high-performance processors end up and to deter smuggling of models such as Nvidia’s H20, which remain subject to licensing requirements for China. Amid the heightened scrutiny, Nvidia published a blog post stressing that its GPUs “do not and should not have kill switches or backdoors,” rebutting claims from Chinese regulators and some U.S. lawmakers that the company’s hardware could be remotely disabled. Nvidia warned that mandated self-destruct or surveillance features would create security vulnerabilities and undermine trust in U.S. technology.