Chinese AI Firms Tap Southeast Asian Clouds for Nvidia Computing Power

US export controls restrict China’s access to Nvidia’s advanced chips, which provide the computing power needed to train frontier artificial intelligence models. But the rules have focused largely on the physical shipment of semiconductors, leaving Chinese companies able to rent infrastructure hosted abroad. That gap has turned cross-border cloud access into a growing national-security concern and a new front in Washington’s effort to slow China’s AI development.

Chinese AI companies are now using cloud data centers in Thailand, Malaysia and other Southeast Asian markets to remotely access Nvidia systems covered by US export restrictions, according to recent reporting. Their demand is also accelerating data-center construction across the region. In response, the US Congress is advancing the Remote Access Security Act, which would seek to close the cloud-computing loophole by extending scrutiny beyond chip sales to overseas access to controlled computing power.