Other News Organizations Have Tried But Are Not Able to Corroborate Bloomberg’s Story ⇥ washingtonpost.com

Erik Wemple, Washington Post:

According to a [Bloomberg] company source, editorial staff has been “frustrated” that competing news organizations haven’t managed to match the scoop. Sources tell the Erik Wemple Blog that the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Post have each sunk resources into confirming the story, only to come up empty-handed. (The Post did run a story summarizing Bloomberg’s findings, along with various denials and official skepticism.) It behooves such outlets to dispatch entire teams to search for corroboration: If, indeed, it’s true that China has embarked on this sort of attack, there will be a long tail of implications. No self-respecting news organization will want to be left out of those stories. “Unlike software, hardware leaves behind a good trail of evidence. If somebody decides to go down that path, it means that they don’t care about the consequences,” Stathakopoulos says.

In the face of challenges to the story’s veracity, Bloomberg has commissioned additional reporting to reinforce its initial findings. One of the story’s reporters, for example, contacted a former Apple employee on Oct. 10 seeking information on the alleged purge of Supermicro servers, according to correspondence reviewed by the Erik Wemple Blog. We asked Bloomberg about any additional reporting on the alleged hack. “We do not comment on our unpublished newsgathering, editorial processes, or plans for future reporting,” replied a company spokeswoman.

Michael Riley, one of the reporters on the story, quickly asserted after the story’s publication that the physical evidence assured that corroborating stories would soon be published. Not only has that not happened, it’s the inverse that has: source after source raising doubts about the accuracy of the story’s core arguments. This isn’t just embarrassing, it’s toxic to Bloomberg’s credibility and the often-necessary use of sources speaking only on background.