Trans-Pacific View | Economy | East Asia

Expanding Export Control to ‘Remote Access’ May Backfire on US AI Ambitions 

The proposed Remote Access Security Act (RASA) could end up delivering Chinese cloud operators the opportunity to displace U.S. tech around the world. 

For years, there have been reports of China utilizing cloud computing infrastructure, particularly in Singapore and other Southeast Asian nations, to bypass U.S. export bans on advanced AI chips. Since early 2024, the United States has proposed requiring U.S. cloud companies to determine whether their data centers and cloud services were being accessed by companies from adversarial nations to train AI models. 

By January 2025, in one of the final export control acts of the Biden administration, the Framework for Artificial Intelligence Diffusion established a framework for validated end-user authorizations under its “trusted datacenter programs,” similar to a “know your customer” (KYC) requirement for cloud operators. 

Now, the Remote Access Security Act (RASA), proposed in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate, attempts to further plug the “cloud compute loophole” by authorizing the U.S. government to regulate not only the export of AI capabilities, but also the usage of such capabilities. On the surface, this seems to be a logical extension of the hardware and software export controls already in place, to further prevent U.S. adversaries from accessing U.S. technologies to train their AI models.

But let’s not forget, two years or so is a very long time in the AI time scale, and a lot has happened. Did we learn our lesson, as far as balancing export controls and advancing U.S. technology globally is concerned? Let’s take a quick look back at the rapid back and forth of policy changes in just the past year or so, and the impact on China-U.S. AI competitive reality. 

Back in April 2025, the Trump administration tightened export controls on Nvidia’s H20 chips, which had been specifically designed to comply with export restrictions for China, and similar chips from other U.S. companies. Needless to say, the industry pushed back and warned that rather than slowing China’s AI development, the restrictions would instead accelerate the adoption of China’s domestically designed and manufactured alternatives, such as those from Huawei. By late 2025, the Trump administration reversed course to approve H20 exports, and later even the more capable H2000 chips under a licensing regime. 

So, did China rejoice and embrace the return of the American chips? No. While Beijing stopped short of banning the import of Nvidia chips, the Chinese authorities delayed, discouraged, or blocked Nvidia purchases by Chinese firms, in favor of grooming its domestic market for its own budding and rapidly improving suppliers such as Huawei and Cambricon. In an interview in May 2026, Nvidia founder Jensen Huang lamented his company’s plunge in the Chinese market share down to “zero.”

This is not to say that export controls on the most advanced AI chips, hardware, software, and manufacturing technologies to China are a mistake. There are strong reasons why these technologies........

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