Week 8 - Huawei, a cautionary tale

I still remember like it was yesterday. We came into work one chilly morning to learn of a “security flaw” that enabled Chinese agents to eavesdrop via Huawei’s new handset. Or so we were told. Flash forward to present day to find that the world’s largest spy agencies don’t want any of their equipment anywhere near their borders. This aversion to the makers’ equipment stems from their close ties with the Chinese military. The belief here is that Huawei “could” be spying for the Chinese military, which of course poses a national security risk. So what’s the problem? Well, despite years of congressional hearings and scrutiny over their technology there has not been a single conclusive answer to the question, is Huawei using their phones to spy for the Chinese military? Sure, concerns have been found but concrete evidence has yet to materialize. Some argue that Huawei is not spying now because they know that getting caught would mean a rapid downfall of the brand and a potential international incident. The ultimate worst-case scenario here is that Huawei’s tech is reverse engineered and implemented by every single telephone company out there in a rush to be the first 5G carrier. Then when the Chinese government is ready, they execute a zero-day vulnerability to steal economic secrets from around the globe. And of course, the damage would be done since immediate removal of the hardware would prove next to impossible. Our government persists that Huawei is a national security concern after a 2012 report from the House Intelligence Committee. What the report didn’t contain is the most shocking to me, evidence. Renown UFC commentator and podcaster Joe Rogan recently said that he believes the reason Huawei and ZTE phones were banned is because they make a better phone for cheaper. He insists that their competitors, namely Samsung and Apple, conspired against Huawei and ZTE to get them banned from most first world nations. I’m far from a conspiracy theorist but in the face of baseless accusations I think that there is more to this story that we don’t know.

Reference

Z. Whittaker. (2019, January 26). Without proof, is Huawei still a national security threat? Retrieved from TECHCRUNCH.com at: https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/26/is-huawei-a-national-security-threat/