Intel delayed in informing U.S. officials about chip flaws until made public

Intel Corp. did not inform U.S. cyber security officials of the so-called Meltdown and Spectre chip security flaws until news leaked to the public, six months after Alphabet Inc notified the chipmaker of the problems, according to letters sent by tech companies to lawmakers on Thursday.

Current and former federal officials have raised concerns that the government was not informed of the flaws before they became public because the flaws potentially held national security implications.

Intel said it did not think the flaws needed to be shared with U.S. authorities as hackers had not exploited the vulnerabilities.

Intel did not tell the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team, better known as US-CERT, about Meltdown and Spectre until Jan. 3, after reports on them in online technology site The Register had begun to circulate.

US-CERT, which issues warnings about cyber security problems to the public and private sector, did not respond to a request for comment.

Details of when the chip flaws were disclosed were detailed in letters sent by Intel, Alphabet and Apple on Thursday in response to questions from U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, an Oregon Republican who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

The letters were seen by Reuters.

Alphabet said that security researchers at its Google Project Zero informed chipmakers Intel, Advanced Micro Devices and SoftBank Group-owned ARM Holdings of the problems in June.