Exceptional splitting of reductions of abelian surfaces (Q2178448)

It was conjectured that an absolutely simple abelian variety over a number field has absolutely simple reduction for a density 1 set of primes if and only if its endomorphism ring is commutative. This conjecture is proved for abelian varieties of dimension 2 or 6 whose geometric endomorphism ring is \(\mathbb Z\); for abelian surfaces with real multiplication; and in full generality conditional on the Mumford-Tate conjecture. Following the latter conjecture, one may ask whether the conjecturally zero density set of primes at which a given abelian variety does not have absolutely simple reduction is finite or infinite. The authors prove that an abelian surface with real multiplication defined over a number field has infinitely many places of split reduction. The strategy of the proof relies on using the theory of Arakelov intersection on the Hilbert modular surface.