Paid Morning Brief: Apple Intelligence to Launch in China with iOS 27.3, Claude Code Plugin Found with Implanted Backdoor

Monday 02 Morning Brief: Apple Intelligence to Launch in China with iOS 27.3 07:22 7-minute read Morning Brief at a Glance

On October 31, Apple announced that the core features of the first batch of Apple Intelligence are about to launch in China. This covers system-wide writing tools, the Photos app's erase tool and natural language search, Genmoji, Mail and notification summaries, and real-time translation seamlessly integrated into Messages and calls. In addition, Siri has been upgraded with coherent conversation and text input support, and can call on Qwen to help answer complex questions or generate original content.

This is the same scope confirmed by Cook in an interview in Shanghai on October 15. Apple initially released these features to US users with iOS 18 in 2024.

The above features will open for testing with the developer beta on November 4, and are planned to roll out to Chinese users with the official release of iOS 27.3 in December. Apple also confirmed a partnership with Alibaba to integrate the Qwen large model in some experiences, providing text and image understanding support for features such as Siri, writing tools, and visual intelligence.

The feature supports iPhone 16 and later models, iPhone Duo, iPhone Air, and the iPhone 15 Pro series, and the device and Siri language must be set to Simplified Chinese or English. This round of updates does not include the next-generation Siri AI features announced at WWDC 2026, and support for platforms other than iPhone will roll out after obtaining relevant regulatory approvals. Didn't they say earlier that support would start with the 15? Why did it change again? I wonder how things are on the EU side. Alibaba's stock hasn't risen either, so it looks like it's already done for. iPhone 14 says, none of my business. I saw someone mention "the boy who cried wolf"—the overseas version is already so bad, could the domestic version really be a "wolf"? View all discussion 10

Apple's bargaining power over flash memory is being suppressed

According to The Wall Street Journal, driven by demand from AI data centers, global flash memory chip prices have soared to five times their original level over the past year, and flash memory suppliers that had long been squeezed by Apple on pricing are seeing a reversal in bargaining power. Research firm TechInsights estimates that Apple's flash memory procurement spending will reach $25 billion in 2026, while procuring the same amount of flash memory in 2025 would cost only $6 billion.

Since launching the iPod Nano in 2005, Apple has long been the world's largest flash memory buyer, able to ensure the lowest procurement prices by auditing supplier accounts and to refuse customized chips when prices fall. During the industry trough in 2023, the global flash memory industry posted an operating loss of $19 billion, while Apple earned $14 billion in gross profit that same year by selling additional storage space. Two years ago, Apple's flash memory purchases were still twice the combined total of Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, and Google.

However, cloud providers' procurement share has now reached twice that of Apple, and they have signed long-term high-price contracts with Japanese flash memory manufacturer Kioxia and others. The unit price of flash memory has risen from a low of 5 cents per GB in 2023 to more than 30 cents.

The surge in costs has squeezed Apple's lucrative storage upgrade profits. As of 2025, the average gross margin of the iPhone and iPad storage upgrade business exceeded 80%. Taking the upgrade from 256 GB to 512 GB as an example, last year the flash memory cost for the iPhone 17 Pro was only $15 (sold for $200), while this year for the iPhone 18 Pro it has risen to $66. Apple has recently raised product prices across the board, with iPhone prices rising by an average of 13%, and even older models that usually see price cuts in previous years have also been raised. In other words, after the flash memory price surge, if the iPhone doesn't raise prices, the profit margin on storage upgrades would be only 66%. The domestic DIY storage modification industry can still survive for a long time.

Official Claude Code extension was implanted with a backdoor

According to Bleeping Computer, on October 29, the extension marketplace of AI code editor Cursor suffered a malicious supply chain attack. A Claude Code plugin (version 2.1.313) posing under Anthropic's official name was listed and circulated in the marketplace for about 11 hours, affecting as many as 5,000 developers. The plugin embedded malicious JavaScript code that attempted to implant a persistent SSH backdoor in victims' systems.

Security firm analysis shows that the plugin could execute silently upon loading without user interaction, collecting host configuration, public IP addresses, Git email addresses, and names of sensitive environment variables and sending them back to the attacker's server. It also attempted to write SSH public keys and configure a reverse tunnel to maintain remote access. However, because its configuration script had execution and permission errors on both macOS and Windows systems, the malicious code failed to successfully start the previously inactive SSH service, limiting the scope of the attacker's actual takeover of devices.

Cursor subsequently removed the extension and briefly shut down the extension marketplace to investigate other projects and rotate access keys; the server used by the attacker has also been blocked through coordinated action. Cursor officially advises users who downloaded the plugin during this time window to check their systems for an SSH key named svc-telemetry, and to follow the security guidance to clean up persistence remnants and rotate related credentials. Anthropic stated that its own internal systems and official distribution channels were not compromised, and that this tampering was limited to the Cursor extension marketplace channel. The title should be something like an impersonating-official plugin, right? 2

US FCC Bans Certification of Electronics for the US Market by Chinese Laboratories

According to Caixin, on October 29, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted to adopt new rules adjusting the recognition procedures for foreign electronic device testing laboratories and certification bodies. Starting December 1, 2028, the United States will no longer recognize the qualifications of laboratories in mainland China, India, and other regions that have not signed a Mutual Recognition Agreement (MRA) with the United States; Taiwan and Hong Kong are on the mutual recognition list.

Under FCC rules, electronic products that emit radio frequencies, such as phones, computers, and IoT devices, must be tested and certified by an authorized laboratory before they can be sold in the United States. Of the 609 FCC-recognized laboratories, 25.1% are located in mainland China, and in 2025 more than 82% of test applications were completed in mainland China; the US domestic share fell from about 31% in 2007 to less than 4%.

The FCC says the new rules are intended to change the situation in which testing business is overly dependent on "non-reciprocal economies." Previously, in 2025, the FCC had revoked or denied the certification qualifications of 15 Chinese laboratories, including the National Radio Monitoring Center and H3C.

Since the draft was published in April this year, the new rules have drawn opposition from multiple parties in China and the United States. The National Notification and Enquiry Center for the WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade of China criticized the move as discriminatory, and US industry associations such as the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) and the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI) also raised objections. The China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Machinery and Electronic Products pointed out that the new rules will force tens of thousands of manufacturers exporting to the United States to relocate their certification business. The FCC estimates that after the business shift, about $79.3 million in additional testing costs will be incurred each year, while several institutions estimate that replacement testing costs will rise by 20% to 400%. It's time to introduce our own standards. Then it won't be targeting only China—the Indians are being targeted too.

Baidu Netdisk Uses Magnetometer Data to Bypass "Shake" Ad Permission

According to BlueDot, a developer used AI to analyze the iOS version of Baidu Netdisk and found that the app can still trigger splash-screen "shake" ads even after the system motion sensor permission is disabled, because its advertising framework has a built-in fallback that reads magnetometer data and includes click-free automatic redirect logic.

The analysis shows that Baidu Netdisk's advertising framework has a variant called NoShake. This variant does not rely on the conventional CoreMotion motion monitoring, but instead calls the CLHeading interface in Apple's Core Location framework to obtain the device's orientation relative to magnetic north and three-axis magnetic field data. When changes in phone posture cause fluctuations in magnetometer data, the ad component can determine that the device has shaken and trigger a redirect.

The report also disclosed a click-free branch in the SDK: when a specific combination of parameters meets the conditions, after triggering it waits about 1 second, and even if the user does not click, the system automatically executes the ad click process; some parameter combinations can even enter the click process directly after triggering. However, because the analysis did not collect real online ad responses, it is not yet possible to confirm which set of parameters was enabled in actual ad delivery.

In the official release of iOS 27.2 released last week, Apple added a "Motion & Fitness" permission for users in mainland China, allowing restrictions on apps reading gyroscope and accelerometer data to block "shake" ads. iOS 27.2 first began testing on September 23, while the tested Baidu Netdisk version 13.36.0 was released on October 22; it is unclear whether this evasion mechanism was added only after the iOS 27.2 beta went live. I suggest simply removing shake detection and just redirecting automatically—it's convenient for you and for me. Baidu Netdisk, oh Netdisk, you're already making membership fees, so why make money in these crooked ways? The timeline matches, Baidu's behavior matches, and Baidu's technical capability matches—it must be a feature added to evade the mechanism. This person's year-end bonus must have doubled this year. The Android version of Hupu is the same: the phone is set to prohibit chain redirects, but tapping the mini-program ads inside still jumps to WeChat. All R&D resources are being used for crooked purposes. View all discussion 81143421

Binance $6.3 Billion in Assets Stolen

According to The Wall Street Journal, Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, suffered the largest hacker theft in cryptocurrency history, with stolen assets worth $6.3 billion. Cybersecurity researchers and investigative agencies pointed out that hackers infiltrated the internal network system by, among other means, compromising a Binance engineer's computer, and initially determined that the mastermind was the North Korean hacker group TraderTraitor.

After the incident, stablecoin issuers such as Tether and Circle helped freeze about $3 billion of the stolen funds, while the remaining approximately $3.3 billion is still controlled by the attackers. To conduct a comprehensive security review, Binance immediately suspended user withdrawals on the platform and said withdrawals were expected to gradually resume within two days. On Sunday, withdrawals of major tokens such as Bitcoin and Ethereum resumed in phases.

Binance co-CEO Richard Teng and founder Changpeng Zhao said the exchange will use the Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU) and company reserve funds to fully cover the losses, and users' asset balances on the platform will not be affected. Binance said it has prepared more than $6.3 billion in dedicated funds to fill the hot wallet shortfall, including about $5 billion in tokens of the same types as those stolen, with the remainder being purchased on the open market.

Data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen shows that Binance's digital wallets currently custody about $167 billion in crypto assets. Binance management said that although the funding gap creates some financial pressure, the scale of the loss is within controllable range given the platform's overall assets and annualized revenue. Will the general use it for a Maybach, or will it flow back? 1

Briefs for a Quick Look

On October 31, Anthropic announced that it would rename the $100-priced Max 5x plan to the Max plan, and the $200-priced Max 20x plan to the Ultra plan. The Ultra plan will remove the five-hour usage limit.

Cisco President and Chief Product Officer Jeetu Patel said in an interview with Fortune that the company allowed one engineer to use unlimited tokens to rewrite legacy code, with the ultimate goal of refactoring 98% of Cisco's legacy code within 24 months.

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