Huawei is one of the biggest communication companies in the world. They do everything you can think of that has anything to do with communication. Mobile phones? Yes. Cellular Towers? You bet. Internet infrastructure? It’s a specialty.
When it comes to communication Huawei is a global leader. They’ve rolled out their services all over China, Europe and Asia. But not the US and not Australia. You can buy their consumer products in Australia and the States…but you won’t find anything else branded Huawei.
What’s worthy of note is the UK has just given Huawei the green light to build a £125 million R&D facility. And the UK is renowned for being US ‘yes men’.
You see, the US isn’t a big fan of Huawei. And hence by default neither is Australia. It all stemmed from a congressional investigation about a year ago. Effectively the US wanted some sort of formal report to back up their refusal to let Huawei in on a couple of takeovers of US companies.
The report was self-made ammunition to throw cyber-espionage accusations at Huawei.
Here are some of the ‘findings from the report:
‘Chinese telecommunications companies provide an opportunity for the Chinese government to tamper with the United States telecommunications supply chain.‘
‘Huawei would not fully describe their history, structure, and management of Huawei and its subsidiaries to the Committee’s satisfaction. The Committee received almost no information on the role of the Chinese Communist Party Committee within Huawei or specifics about how Huawei interacts in formal channels with the Chinese government.‘
The US believes Huawei actively conducts cyber-espionage on behalf of the Chinese government. Or at the very least provides the technical assistance to allow it.
Well if the pot isn’t calling the kettle black… I’m pretty sure last time I checked the Chinese government hadn’t publicly investigated AT&T.
AT&T Might Be the US Version of Huawei
But hang on, how is that the same you ask? Well the current US Secretary of Defence, Chuck Hagel, has something to do with it.
After serving in the Vietnam War Hagel returned to the US a war hero. He turned his hand to business, co-founding a small phone company, Vanguard Cellular. Hagel took Vanguard on to be the second largest communications provider in the US. In the first quarter of 1999 AT&T purchased Vanguard Cellular in a deal worth $1.5 billion.
Now admittedly Mr. Hagel cashed out. But really when you found and build a billion dollar business how far away do you ever stay? Either way surely that’s sufficient grounds for China to ask the same questions of AT&T?
My point is the US is great at pointing the finger while using their other hand to hack China’s online systems. This is the kind of behaviour that’s typical of warring parties in World War D.
For a year the accusations have flown thick and fast about Huawei. And the US doesn’t look like changing their mind on the company any time soon. But things have started to take a turn for the positive (or negative?) in Australia.
The former Labor government put a kibosh on Huawei last year. It was a classic move straight out of the US Homeland Security playbook. Labor’s excuse was something to do with the NBN and cyber-espionage. But really what they were saying was, ‘Because the US told us to.’
However, we’ve got a new government now. And being the ‘progressive’ mob they believe themselves to be, they’ve decided to review the ‘Huawei Ban’.
Could Huawei be the NBN’s Saviour?
Initially Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull came out and said in an interview with BRW:
‘Even if you accept the premise that Huawei would be an accessory to espionage – I’m not saying they will be, I’m just saying that’s the premise – if you accept that, you then have to ask yourself, does the equipment that they would propose to sell have that capacity?‘
And then yesterday in relation to Huawei Trade Minister Andrew Robb said,
‘I strongly support the review and I’ve said it to Malcolm.‘
Huawei themselves even released a white paper over the weekend. The topic? None other than cyber security. It reinforced their innocence in all this to-ing and fro-ing. Part of the paper said (take a deep breath):
‘We will support and adopt any internationally agreed standard or best practice for cyber security in its broadest sense; we will support any research effort to improve cyber defences; we will continue to improve and adopt an open and transparent approach enabling governments to review Huawei’s security capabilities, and finally, as we have done to date, we warmly welcome the assistance from our customers in enhancing our processes, our technology, and our approach to cyber security so that we can provide even greater benefits to them and their customers.‘
Obviously a security expert wrote that, as it’s possibly the longest sentence of all time.
But the point to all of this is who do you trust? On one hand the US is saying, ‘these guys are cyber spies’. On the other hand Huawei are saying, ‘c’mon guys we’re just trying to run a legitimate business here’.
Then you’ve got Australia kind of stuck in the middle thinking, ‘Maybe Huawei can help us get this pesky NBN project finished.’
This is the dilemma that we face in World War D. There’s no doubt the US and the Chinese lob digital attacks on each other daily. If you’re at all doubtful of that go to Google’s Digital Attack Map. And with both playing the innocence card, who can you trust? That’s the big question facing the Aussie government now.
To be fair in World War D you can’t trust anyone. But you can do a lot to protect yourself. It might mean using the Deep Web to browse the web in ‘Stealth Mode’.
It might mean employing technologies from pioneering companies to keep your personal networks safe. It might even simply be investing in companies that are set to profit from a cyber-security market predicted to grow to over $120 billion in the next four years.
For what it’s worth I hope Australia drops the ban on Huawei. Even if there are some dubious elements to how they run the business. Besides, I said it yesterday when I wrote about Google’s foray into Cyber Security…keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
Sam Volkering+
Technology Analyst, Revolutionary Tech Investor
Ed Note: Sam recently produced a video where he explores inside the ‘Deep Web’. It’s only available to Revolutionary Tech Investor subscribers. To find out how to access this video and find out more about the revolutionary ideas shaping the world, click here…
