17 ms·

British Telecom bars Huawei's 5G kit from core of network

133 points by zerogvt 8y ago

xrayzerone 8y ago
> Huawei denies having any ties to the Chinese government beyond those of being a law-abiding taxpayer. I find it interesting that these kinds of verbal games are continually played out in the public eye despite everyone involved knowing exactly what's going on. And that goes for all APT / nation-state actors.
- dhx 8y ago
  Australia has effectively banned Huawei since 2012 (NBN participation ban). Therefore, there is plenty of discourse and information from Australia about technology sovereignty. The article at [1] directly addresses the claim: > Huawei denies having any ties to the Chinese government beyond those of being a law-abiding taxpayer. Articles at [2] also provide more in-depth analysis. [1] https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/huawei-and-the-ambiguity-of-chinas-intelligence-and-counter-espionage-laws/ https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/huawei-and-the-ambiguity-o... [2] https://www.aspi.org.au/report/huawei-and-australias-5g-network https://www.aspi.org.au/report/huawei-and-australias-5g-netw...
  - ShorsHammer 8y ago
    The irony here in that Australia just passed laws requiring local vendors to put in backdoors at the governments request, not just for national security but also in regards to "national economic well-being" aka industrial espionage.
londons_explore 8y ago
Considering that one can purchase a zero day exploit in pretty much any piece of network equipment for ~$50k, I don't see how these 'national security' claims hold up. For a government who wants to spy, the difference between inserting your own exploit in a piece of equipment and paying $50k to find an existing exploit is insignificant. Using an existing exploit is preferable anyway, because then it's harder to trace the origins of the exploit back to you.
- xfitm3 8y ago
  Do you have a source for zero day exploit costs?
  - londons_explore 8y ago
    Not many public sources, but this is a good reference [1]. Vulnerability in a specific piece of network kit is typically easier to find (and therefore cheaper) than a vulnerability in something like nginx, since many vulnerabilities are in the custom configs, wrapper scripts, and lower quality OEM code used for the software on a specific device rather than the software itself. [1]: https://zerodium.com/program.html https://zerodium.com/program.html (scroll down)
- zby 8y ago
  It is always better to have more options - but it is also a matter of trust - how much can you trust a bought zero day? Especially when your opponent is the UK state.
  - wallace_f 8y ago
    Trust? In terms of competency of the exploit? I've wondered how the security experts privately regard nation state security personnel and teams? For example, no government was competing to employ Barnaby Jack. And of course government is notorious for inefficiency and incompetence when producing goods and services. Of course nation states also have enormous advantages over any other individual or group.
  - londons_explore 8y ago
    The only trust risk is that the guy you bought it from also told someone else, and they're just waiting for you to use the exploit so they can 'spy on your spying'. That risk can be mitigated by just hiring someone in-house to find exploits. Security services employ lots of exploit finders for that reason.
- cm2187 8y ago
  Compromising a home router or a web server doesn't have the same consequences than compromising the backbone of the infrastructure.
Theodores 8y ago
The problem is that Huawei kit does not have GCHQ/NSA backdoor capabilities. Hence it has to be banished. The story has not changed since five years ago: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/25/huawei_responds_to_spying_allegations/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/25/huawei_responds_to_... It would be commercial suicide for Huawei to have backdoored their export products. For the Chinese domestic market they may have 'Great Firewall' extras to them but for export products it simply makes no business sense. There is zero evidence in the public domain to support the hysterical allegations of the crazy folks in our domestic military-industrial-espionage complex. In former times there was this quaint notion of innocent until proven guilty. It is time we grow up a bit and stop slandering our Chinese friends. Xenophobia has never helped. Edit: Instead of downvoting, please explain the flaws in my comment, whether they be based on unsubstantiated claims, tone of voice or just personal grudge. Thank-you.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  If people can readily refute this then citations would be appreciated?
- threeseed 8y ago
  Nobody is slandering the Chinese people and this has nothing to do with xenophobia. This is purely about the actions of the Chinese government who have built their military on the back of IP theft. Much of which has been obtained through backdoors etc. And this isn’t a courtroom so the whole innocent until guilty concept makes no sense.
  - stult 8y ago
    >And this isn’t a courtroom so the whole innocent until guilty concept makes no sense. In fact, if anything, the opposite principle should apply in the context of systems security.
    - dis-sys 8y ago
      are you suggesting that Chinese should ban all UK high tech stuff in China until it can be proven to be backdoor free? sounds like a fair reaction to me.
pjc50 8y ago
So something has changed, because there used to be a weird little collaboration/supervision operation going on between BT, Huawei, and UK Intelligence at Martlesham Heath. https://www.eadt.co.uk/business/martlesham-heath-huawei-pledges-to-invest-370m-in-superfast-5g-mobile-network-1-2972789 https://www.eadt.co.uk/business/martlesham-heath-huawei-pled...
- Angostura 8y ago
  Well, to be clear, that article just says that Huawei has an R&D Centre on Ad Astral Park. There are about 100 companies there.
  - cbzbc 8y ago
    It does go further than that. The best introduction is probably the latest annual report: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/727415/20180717_HCSEC_Oversight_Board_Report_2018_-_FINAL.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... From the report: "HCSEC is a facility in Banbury, Oxfordshire, belonging to Huawei Technologies (UK) Co Ltd, whose parent company is a Chinese headquartered company which is now one of the world’s largest telecommunications providers. HCSEC has been running for seven years. It opened in November 2010 under a set of arrangements between Huawei and HMG to mitigate any perceived risks arising from the involvement of Huawei in parts of the UK’s critical national infrastructure. HCSEC provides security evaluation for a range of products used in the UK telecommunications market. Through HCSEC, the UK Government is provided with insight into Huawei’s UK’s strategies and product ranges. The UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC, and previously GCHQ), as the national technical authority for information assurance and the lead Government operational agency on cyber security, leads for the Government in dealing with HCSEC and with Huawei more generally on technical security matters."
    - jburgess777 8y ago
      This report also included this statement in the summary: "Due to areas of concern exposed through the proper functioning of the mitigation strategy and associated oversight mechanisms, the Oversight Board can provide only limited assurance that all risks to UK national security from Huawei’s involvement in the UK’s critical networks have been sufficiently mitigated." The publication triggered headlines in multiple news outlets at the time, e.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-44891913 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-44891913
zby 8y ago
"Backdoor in event-stream library dependency" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18534392 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18534392 https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/nov/29/why-we-stopped-trusting-elites-the-new-populism https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/nov/29/why-we-stopped-...? Trust!
lukebennett 8y ago
Not directly related to the story, but just for info - "British Telecom" is an incorrect name (it's not used in the BBC article). The company renamed from that to BT in 1991.
- cjrp 8y ago
  They also use "better together" in a lot of marketing, but don't seem to have officially rebranded.
  - strictfp 8y ago
    Life's Good - Lucky Goldstar
    - chithanh 8y ago
      ESSO - Standard Oil (well that wasn't voluntary, but still)
- porpoisely 8y ago
  Didn't British Petroleum do the same thing? Now they are exclusively known as BP.
  - juanuys 8y ago
    I was reminded of this when Obama still referred to BP as British Petroleum during the oil spill: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10303619 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10303619
setquk 8y ago
Edit: UK outage vendor confirmed as Ericsson: https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/ericsson-software-glitch-hits-mobile-services-in-britain-and-japan-idUKKBN1O51I2 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/erics... Old paranoia filled post left below for reference. Thanks to saaaaaam for pointing the above link out. ---- There's something going on here, political or technical. O2/Telefonica subcontracted out a lot of their core to Huawei in 2012 [1]. Literally today, after their CFO was arrested in Canada [2], we've been hit with a massive telecoms outage here in the UK which has taken out data / SMS. O2 have stated that it's due to one of their technology provider's software [3]. Edit: Giffgaff (virtual provider) have also stated that this is a global problem which is even more worrying [4] I hope this is a coincidence. We've had data down here in UK from 0500 to 14:00 so far... China stock is falling, this happened, Huawei already have a somewhat iffy reputation and now BT is throwing out news about jumping ship from them suddenly. [1] http://telecoms.com/44197/huawei-wins-managed-services-deal-with-o2-uk/ http://telecoms.com/44197/huawei-wins-managed-services-deal-... [2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46465768 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46465768 [3] https://twitter.com/O2/status/1070612301110226944 https://twitter.com/O2/status/1070612301110226944 [4] https://twitter.com/giffgaff/status/1070674248606339072 https://twitter.com/giffgaff/status/1070674248606339072
- tossaccount123 8y ago
  Huawei is rumored to have backdoored the African Union and Trump has been pushing other countries to get tough on China in general for stealing IP. This is essentially an extension of the trade war and valid fears that the Chinese government may be spying on you if you use Huewei
- saaaaaam 8y ago
  It’s being reported that the outage is probably related to Ericsson. “The company said that the problem stemed from a global software issue at a third-party supplier, understood to be Ericsson, which has also affected other mobile operators around the world.” https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/06/o2-customers-unable-to-get-online https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/06/o2-customer... Edit: also apparently confirmed by Ericsson themselves. https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/ericsson-software-glitch-hits-mobile-services-in-britain-and-japan-idUKKBN1O51I2 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/erics...
kennydude 8y ago
> still plans to use the Chinese company's phone mast antennas and other products deemed not to be at the "core" of the service. So apparently phone masts aren't "core" to a _phone network_?
- LeoPanthera 8y ago
  I'm going to assume that stuff that doesn't have software in it is probably trustworthy. It's hard to backdoor a metal pole.
- noselasd 8y ago
  It likely refers to the technical definition of the core of a telco network, see e.g. the evolved packet core part of a 4g/lte network https://i.ytimg.com/vi/6dt9xVMvtB8/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/6dt9xVMvtB8/maxresdefault.jpg , of which the eNodeb's ("phone masts") are not part of. At least for 4g some layers of the control plane and all the user plane data are encrypted when passed through the eNodeb's. Albeit an eNodeb can probably do a lot of nefarious things if it wants to. Or they mean literally just the phone masts and antennas - which are just inert components.
  - kennydude 8y ago
    That makes more sense. Cheers :)
infinity0 8y ago
> However, critics point out that its founder, Ren Zhengfei, was a former engineer in the country's army and joined the Communist Party in 1978. There are also questions about how independent of state influence any large Chinese company can be. Is this really the best they can come up with? I've never heard any more specific accusations, in any media. Sounds pretty racist. (I have seen specific accusations that Huawei is violating sanctions, but that is a separate concern from national security in infrastructure.)
- ancorevard 8y ago
  Corporate espionage and military intelligence are not clearly separated in China, and this is due to the culture and values of the Chinese Communist Party. This is seen as the same thing, advancing towards the same goal. This is arguable less of the case in other countries, which is why people in other countries don't understand what is going on right now (i.e. why Huawei is seen as a security threat). The concern is, if you in the future cross the will of the Chinese Communist Party, your national infrastructure may suddenly...behave differently.
  - infinity0 8y ago
    > Corporate espionage and military intelligence are not clearly separated in China, and this is due to the culture and values of the Chinese Communist Party. Any specific examples or accusations????
    - rrix2 8y ago
      Their intelligence tactics are pretty widely known at this point, here's four different sources. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_intelligence_activity_abroad https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_intelligence_activit... > It is believed that Chinese espionage is aimed at the preservation of China's national security through gaining commercial, technological, and military secrets.[2][3][4][5]
    - scarejunba 8y ago
      It’s mostly science fiction at this point. You’ll only get vague comments at best. It may well be true, but the people you’re talking to don’t know. Always remember: you’re almost certainly talking to a software engineer with an active imagination using Wikipedia to selectively back up their stories.
lostmsu 8y ago
Seems like they started fight with Huawei via non-market means. Does it mean its actually a successful hardware company, threatening Apple/Samsung dominance? As for fears, they could mandate open source with reproducible builds for all security critical infrastructure hardware.
- dunpeal 8y ago
  Pretty sure Huawei is getting targeted for a reason, and not just because it's a "successful hardware company". Neither the US nor the UK have any interest in protecting Samsung from competition. My guess is that there's been some discoveries related to how aggressively Huawei is spying.
berti 8y ago
Recently we had a situation in New Zealand where a large telco announced Huawei would provide their 5G kit for the entire network, then days later had to retract because the national intelligence agency barred the deal [0]. [0] https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12167798 https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&...
- dis-sys 8y ago
  Many are asking the same legitimate question - what is the point keeping the free trade agreement with NZ when Chinese products are being treated like that.
  - zaphirplane 8y ago
    Who are the many? One side says the equipment isn’t secure, that isn’t related to free trade. I suppose a lot of countries selling asbestos and aerosol are upset
    - dis-sys 8y ago
      > Who are the many? are you assuming that there are not many hardliners in China? > One side says the equipment isn’t secure after so many years with so many Huawei equipments used in the west, when all kinds of security experts and law enforcements officials all have 24/7 access to those devices, when the state of the art analysis tools and procedures are all available to them, any actual backdoor intentionally placed by Huawei got busted?
      - zaphirplane 8y ago
        You are making the assumption that a backdoor needs to be active now, not a sleeper backdoor that is a activated on a trigger What about future firmware upgrade or hardware replacement that isn’t vetted today. What triggered all this was BT found the equipment was too chatty
        8y ago

133 points by zerogvt 8y ago

> Huawei denies having any ties to the Chinese government beyond those of being a law-abiding taxpayer. I find it interesting that these kinds of verbal games are continually played out in the public eye despite everyone involved knowing exactly what's going on. And that goes for all APT / nation-state actors.

dhx 8y ago
Australia has effectively banned Huawei since 2012 (NBN participation ban). Therefore, there is plenty of discourse and information from Australia about technology sovereignty. The article at [1] directly addresses the claim: > Huawei denies having any ties to the Chinese government beyond those of being a law-abiding taxpayer. Articles at [2] also provide more in-depth analysis. [1] https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/huawei-and-the-ambiguity-of-chinas-intelligence-and-counter-espionage-laws/ https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/huawei-and-the-ambiguity-o... [2] https://www.aspi.org.au/report/huawei-and-australias-5g-network https://www.aspi.org.au/report/huawei-and-australias-5g-netw...
- ShorsHammer 8y ago
  The irony here in that Australia just passed laws requiring local vendors to put in backdoors at the governments request, not just for national security but also in regards to "national economic well-being" aka industrial espionage.

londons_explore 8y ago

Considering that one can purchase a zero day exploit in pretty much any piece of network equipment for ~$50k, I don't see how these 'national security' claims hold up. For a government who wants to spy, the difference between inserting your own exploit in a piece of equipment and paying $50k to find an existing exploit is insignificant. Using an existing exploit is preferable anyway, because then it's harder to trace the origins of the exploit back to you.

xfitm3 8y ago
Do you have a source for zero day exploit costs?
- londons_explore 8y ago
  Not many public sources, but this is a good reference [1]. Vulnerability in a specific piece of network kit is typically easier to find (and therefore cheaper) than a vulnerability in something like nginx, since many vulnerabilities are in the custom configs, wrapper scripts, and lower quality OEM code used for the software on a specific device rather than the software itself. [1]: https://zerodium.com/program.html https://zerodium.com/program.html (scroll down)
zby 8y ago
It is always better to have more options - but it is also a matter of trust - how much can you trust a bought zero day? Especially when your opponent is the UK state.
- wallace_f 8y ago
  Trust? In terms of competency of the exploit? I've wondered how the security experts privately regard nation state security personnel and teams? For example, no government was competing to employ Barnaby Jack. And of course government is notorious for inefficiency and incompetence when producing goods and services. Of course nation states also have enormous advantages over any other individual or group.
- londons_explore 8y ago
  The only trust risk is that the guy you bought it from also told someone else, and they're just waiting for you to use the exploit so they can 'spy on your spying'. That risk can be mitigated by just hiring someone in-house to find exploits. Security services employ lots of exploit finders for that reason.
cm2187 8y ago
Compromising a home router or a web server doesn't have the same consequences than compromising the backbone of the infrastructure.

Theodores 8y ago

The problem is that Huawei kit does not have GCHQ/NSA backdoor capabilities. Hence it has to be banished. The story has not changed since five years ago: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/25/huawei_responds_to_spying_allegations/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/25/huawei_responds_to_... It would be commercial suicide for Huawei to have backdoored their export products. For the Chinese domestic market they may have 'Great Firewall' extras to them but for export products it simply makes no business sense. There is zero evidence in the public domain to support the hysterical allegations of the crazy folks in our domestic military-industrial-espionage complex. In former times there was this quaint notion of innocent until proven guilty. It is time we grow up a bit and stop slandering our Chinese friends. Xenophobia has never helped. Edit: Instead of downvoting, please explain the flaws in my comment, whether they be based on unsubstantiated claims, tone of voice or just personal grudge. Thank-you.

pbhjpbhj 8y ago
If people can readily refute this then citations would be appreciated?
threeseed 8y ago
Nobody is slandering the Chinese people and this has nothing to do with xenophobia. This is purely about the actions of the Chinese government who have built their military on the back of IP theft. Much of which has been obtained through backdoors etc. And this isn’t a courtroom so the whole innocent until guilty concept makes no sense.
- stult 8y ago
  >And this isn’t a courtroom so the whole innocent until guilty concept makes no sense. In fact, if anything, the opposite principle should apply in the context of systems security.
  - dis-sys 8y ago
    are you suggesting that Chinese should ban all UK high tech stuff in China until it can be proven to be backdoor free? sounds like a fair reaction to me.

pjc50 8y ago

So something has changed, because there used to be a weird little collaboration/supervision operation going on between BT, Huawei, and UK Intelligence at Martlesham Heath. https://www.eadt.co.uk/business/martlesham-heath-huawei-pledges-to-invest-370m-in-superfast-5g-mobile-network-1-2972789 https://www.eadt.co.uk/business/martlesham-heath-huawei-pled...

Angostura 8y ago
Well, to be clear, that article just says that Huawei has an R&D Centre on Ad Astral Park. There are about 100 companies there.
- cbzbc 8y ago
  It does go further than that. The best introduction is probably the latest annual report: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/727415/20180717_HCSEC_Oversight_Board_Report_2018_-_FINAL.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... From the report: "HCSEC is a facility in Banbury, Oxfordshire, belonging to Huawei Technologies (UK) Co Ltd, whose parent company is a Chinese headquartered company which is now one of the world’s largest telecommunications providers. HCSEC has been running for seven years. It opened in November 2010 under a set of arrangements between Huawei and HMG to mitigate any perceived risks arising from the involvement of Huawei in parts of the UK’s critical national infrastructure. HCSEC provides security evaluation for a range of products used in the UK telecommunications market. Through HCSEC, the UK Government is provided with insight into Huawei’s UK’s strategies and product ranges. The UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC, and previously GCHQ), as the national technical authority for information assurance and the lead Government operational agency on cyber security, leads for the Government in dealing with HCSEC and with Huawei more generally on technical security matters."
  - jburgess777 8y ago
    This report also included this statement in the summary: "Due to areas of concern exposed through the proper functioning of the mitigation strategy and associated oversight mechanisms, the Oversight Board can provide only limited assurance that all risks to UK national security from Huawei’s involvement in the UK’s critical networks have been sufficiently mitigated." The publication triggered headlines in multiple news outlets at the time, e.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-44891913 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-44891913

zby 8y ago

"Backdoor in event-stream library dependency" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18534392 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18534392 https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/nov/29/why-we-stopped-trusting-elites-the-new-populism https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/nov/29/why-we-stopped-...? Trust!

lukebennett 8y ago

Not directly related to the story, but just for info - "British Telecom" is an incorrect name (it's not used in the BBC article). The company renamed from that to BT in 1991.

cjrp 8y ago
They also use "better together" in a lot of marketing, but don't seem to have officially rebranded.
- strictfp 8y ago
  Life's Good - Lucky Goldstar
  - chithanh 8y ago
    ESSO - Standard Oil (well that wasn't voluntary, but still)
porpoisely 8y ago
Didn't British Petroleum do the same thing? Now they are exclusively known as BP.
- juanuys 8y ago
  I was reminded of this when Obama still referred to BP as British Petroleum during the oil spill: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10303619 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10303619

setquk 8y ago

Edit: UK outage vendor confirmed as Ericsson: https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/ericsson-software-glitch-hits-mobile-services-in-britain-and-japan-idUKKBN1O51I2 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/erics... Old paranoia filled post left below for reference. Thanks to saaaaaam for pointing the above link out. ---- There's something going on here, political or technical. O2/Telefonica subcontracted out a lot of their core to Huawei in 2012 [1]. Literally today, after their CFO was arrested in Canada [2], we've been hit with a massive telecoms outage here in the UK which has taken out data / SMS. O2 have stated that it's due to one of their technology provider's software [3]. Edit: Giffgaff (virtual provider) have also stated that this is a global problem which is even more worrying [4] I hope this is a coincidence. We've had data down here in UK from 0500 to 14:00 so far... China stock is falling, this happened, Huawei already have a somewhat iffy reputation and now BT is throwing out news about jumping ship from them suddenly. [1] http://telecoms.com/44197/huawei-wins-managed-services-deal-with-o2-uk/ http://telecoms.com/44197/huawei-wins-managed-services-deal-... [2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46465768 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-46465768 [3] https://twitter.com/O2/status/1070612301110226944 https://twitter.com/O2/status/1070612301110226944 [4] https://twitter.com/giffgaff/status/1070674248606339072 https://twitter.com/giffgaff/status/1070674248606339072

tossaccount123 8y ago
Huawei is rumored to have backdoored the African Union and Trump has been pushing other countries to get tough on China in general for stealing IP. This is essentially an extension of the trade war and valid fears that the Chinese government may be spying on you if you use Huewei
saaaaaam 8y ago
It’s being reported that the outage is probably related to Ericsson. “The company said that the problem stemed from a global software issue at a third-party supplier, understood to be Ericsson, which has also affected other mobile operators around the world.” https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/06/o2-customers-unable-to-get-online https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/dec/06/o2-customer... Edit: also apparently confirmed by Ericsson themselves. https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/ericsson-software-glitch-hits-mobile-services-in-britain-and-japan-idUKKBN1O51I2 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-o2telefonica-outages/erics...

kennydude 8y ago

> still plans to use the Chinese company's phone mast antennas and other products deemed not to be at the "core" of the service. So apparently phone masts aren't "core" to a _phone network_?

LeoPanthera 8y ago
I'm going to assume that stuff that doesn't have software in it is probably trustworthy. It's hard to backdoor a metal pole.
noselasd 8y ago
It likely refers to the technical definition of the core of a telco network, see e.g. the evolved packet core part of a 4g/lte network https://i.ytimg.com/vi/6dt9xVMvtB8/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/6dt9xVMvtB8/maxresdefault.jpg , of which the eNodeb's ("phone masts") are not part of. At least for 4g some layers of the control plane and all the user plane data are encrypted when passed through the eNodeb's. Albeit an eNodeb can probably do a lot of nefarious things if it wants to. Or they mean literally just the phone masts and antennas - which are just inert components.
- kennydude 8y ago
  That makes more sense. Cheers :)

infinity0 8y ago

> However, critics point out that its founder, Ren Zhengfei, was a former engineer in the country's army and joined the Communist Party in 1978. There are also questions about how independent of state influence any large Chinese company can be. Is this really the best they can come up with? I've never heard any more specific accusations, in any media. Sounds pretty racist. (I have seen specific accusations that Huawei is violating sanctions, but that is a separate concern from national security in infrastructure.)

ancorevard 8y ago
Corporate espionage and military intelligence are not clearly separated in China, and this is due to the culture and values of the Chinese Communist Party. This is seen as the same thing, advancing towards the same goal. This is arguable less of the case in other countries, which is why people in other countries don't understand what is going on right now (i.e. why Huawei is seen as a security threat). The concern is, if you in the future cross the will of the Chinese Communist Party, your national infrastructure may suddenly...behave differently.
- infinity0 8y ago
  > Corporate espionage and military intelligence are not clearly separated in China, and this is due to the culture and values of the Chinese Communist Party. Any specific examples or accusations????
  - rrix2 8y ago
    Their intelligence tactics are pretty widely known at this point, here's four different sources. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_intelligence_activity_abroad https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_intelligence_activit... > It is believed that Chinese espionage is aimed at the preservation of China's national security through gaining commercial, technological, and military secrets.[2][3][4][5]
  - scarejunba 8y ago
    It’s mostly science fiction at this point. You’ll only get vague comments at best. It may well be true, but the people you’re talking to don’t know. Always remember: you’re almost certainly talking to a software engineer with an active imagination using Wikipedia to selectively back up their stories.

lostmsu 8y ago

Seems like they started fight with Huawei via non-market means. Does it mean its actually a successful hardware company, threatening Apple/Samsung dominance? As for fears, they could mandate open source with reproducible builds for all security critical infrastructure hardware.

dunpeal 8y ago
Pretty sure Huawei is getting targeted for a reason, and not just because it's a "successful hardware company". Neither the US nor the UK have any interest in protecting Samsung from competition. My guess is that there's been some discoveries related to how aggressively Huawei is spying.

berti 8y ago

Recently we had a situation in New Zealand where a large telco announced Huawei would provide their 5G kit for the entire network, then days later had to retract because the national intelligence agency barred the deal [0]. [0] https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12167798 https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&...

dis-sys 8y ago
Many are asking the same legitimate question - what is the point keeping the free trade agreement with NZ when Chinese products are being treated like that.
- zaphirplane 8y ago
  Who are the many? One side says the equipment isn’t secure, that isn’t related to free trade. I suppose a lot of countries selling asbestos and aerosol are upset
  - dis-sys 8y ago
    > Who are the many? are you assuming that there are not many hardliners in China? > One side says the equipment isn’t secure after so many years with so many Huawei equipments used in the west, when all kinds of security experts and law enforcements officials all have 24/7 access to those devices, when the state of the art analysis tools and procedures are all available to them, any actual backdoor intentionally placed by Huawei got busted?
    - zaphirplane 8y ago
      You are making the assumption that a backdoor needs to be active now, not a sleeper backdoor that is a activated on a trigger What about future firmware upgrade or hardware replacement that isn’t vetted today. What triggered all this was BT found the equipment was too chatty
      - 8y ago