Huawei risk can be managed, say UK cyber-security chiefs
bbc.co.uk
bbc.co.uk
It could potentially be a good book in 1-200 years' time once all this is declassified.
Despite this, it sounds like the UK is still removing Huawei devices from the most critical areas of their networks.
> In addition, Huawei had at some point declined to install NSA backdoors
I think a statement like this needs some corroboration beyond word of mouth
I'd like to see that same standard applied to the initial allegations against Huawei. Still no proof that they've done anything wrong.
[1] https://www.tomshardware.com/news/cisco-backdoor-hardcoded-a...
https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/bts-mcrae-huawei-is-t...
This is Brexit. The UK is trying not to depend on the EU too much either and are actively trying to diversify.
The whole security story around Huawei is largely overblown and driven by the US's increasing realisation that they won't be the undisputed top dog for long.
The UK is not in that situation. They are a medium power leaving the largest trading bloc in the world and they need China. As such they need to be realistic when assessing risk and have a pragmatic approach.
Does anyone seriously believe that if Xi Jinping orders Huawei to deploy a backdoor, they will resist?
As someone else further mentioned, the UK has setup an evaluation centre with Huawei where GCHQ experts check Huawei products before deployment.
Again, let's not pretend that the the US are in good faith here even if security should of course always be considered. This is an obvious FUD campaign to slow the rise of a new superpower and of a major competitor in a sensitive industry.
This betrays an incredible lack of foresight. Denying updates to products to evaluate in the first place is itself a point of serious potential vulnerability.
> Again, let's not pretend that the the US are in good faith here even if security should of course always be considered. This is an obvious FUD campaign to slow the rise of a new superpower and of a major competitor in a sensitive industry.
You're making this about the US when it doesn't have to be. That was the point of my comment: the UK has options that don't have anything to do with the US or China. I cannot believe that you genuinely view the risks of dealing with Sweden (Ericsson) or Finland (Nokia) and China for such sensitive infrastructure as comparable. I must have missed the Swedish hacking campaign of companies and governments worldwide for the last 10 years...
No, this is an agreement to build an acceptable way forward for both sides by addressing issues (real or perceived).
> You're making this about the US when it doesn't have to be.
The whole campaign against Huawei has been launched and is led by the US.
This is where the noise comes from and this has made dealing with China more difficult for the UK because of that noise in the media.
It also matters what you think of the governments that are potentially exerting control. China is way down the list of governments I'd like to have access to critical infrastructure.
I can't tell what HCSEC thinks they're doing. Plenty of security research shows that in reality skilled engineers can plant backdoors no-one can find, especially at the hardware level. Apparently most HCSEC staff are Huawei employees so they don't exactly have an incentive to find backdoors. It sounds like a joke.
The real issue is that the UK is part of the 5 Eyes, so it has a special reason to be happier about being spied on by Americans.
Get off your high horse a bit. Any moral credit US had was blown off the face of earth with Snowden revelations.
You probably don't understand a simple thing - for anyone outside of US ie in Europe, US vs China is not such a clear cut. There is tremendously long list of things US messed up in last 70 years and poured oil tankers-size amount of evil into this world and the consequences are and will be felt for decades to come. No slowing down in sight either.
I know this doesn't fit with the witch hunt on Chinese companies the US is running but there you have it.
Indeed, this kind of money is rarely invested without a known, outsized, expected return and, in this, I seriously doubt Huawei and their owners are lacking in intelligence. I mean, who do we think they are - Winnie-the-Pooh?
Indeed, this kind of money is rarely invested without a known, outsized, expected return and, in this, I seriously doubt Boeing and Airbus and their owners are lacking in intelligence. I mean, who do we think they are - Winnie-the-Pooh?
So much for China being inferior copycats then...
HCSEC had 30 staff in 2015. Are they claiming to have done a line-by-line audit of all Huawei's code by now?
“Huawei is required to have reproducable builds”
doesn’t protect from hardware backdoors. That solution is the proper solution to the software backdoors, again:
“the code running in the network is the exactly same as what was vetted by CSEC.”
It could surely prove something: those are reproducible builds. That means you can prove after some breach is detected that it originates from the given sources, if it is so. That in turn means that if something happens it won’t be Huawei employees who would investigate these sources. I’m sure that once a company offers the sources like this the company itself won’t plan to mess with the sources. Because then the unwanten intervention can be proved.
They cannot afford to fall for the US-led hysteria.