Realpolitik meets the road
Edward Snowden in scrolling through our browser histories.
This has irked Beijing and so $26 billion of trade with China is at risk. Once again a young Labour prime minister faces a choice between protecting our values and protecting our economy.
It is one she has to make only because of the incomprehensible failure of our security services. To prevent a theoretical security risk by using Chinese routers that will be obsolete in two years, the GCSB have succeeded in antagonising our largest trading partner and exposed us to the risk of a ruinous trade war.
In terms of incompetence this makes the GCSB’s illegal spying on Kim Dotcom seem benign. But let’s not credit this decision merely to negligence because the proposed 5G rollout will render the Crown’s $1.5bn investment in the ultrafast broadband worthless.
It’s possible the decision was designed to protect this asset. Which would put us in good company. The campaign against Huawei is being driven by US protectionist forces.
China, like New Zealand, has laws that require infrastructure providers to build in the ability for the state to snoop on our communications. Despite this, no hard evidence of a back door has yet been discovered and even if it did exist, it might not matter. After all the FBI couldn’t crack the security on a store-bought iPhone in a recent terrorist case in San Bernardino, California.
Even if your data is being intercepted, you can encrypt communications. This might surprise the GCSB, who still steam open envelopes and think WhatsApp is a strange saying the cool kids use.
More importantly, let’s assume Huawei was guilty. So what? Nothing China could learn from reading our emails or observing our porn preferences could do a fraction of the damage that dumping 500,000 tonnes of milk power into a crowded market would.
Ardern now faces her Lange moment and must confront the realities and responsibilities of her office. It is time to walk the decision back, kowtow, and get back to the serious business of not building houses.