Huawei under pressure from Aussie spy reports
Huawei has come under more pressure with the Australian running a report about the Chinese maker of telecommunications gear allegedly being involved in espionage.
But Spark NZ says it is standing by its key supplier, and Huawei calls the story vague and unsubstantiated — and notes its key rivals Nokia and Ericsson are also entangled in any allegations through their joint enterprises in China.
Secret intelligence reports given to Australian officials outlined a case in which Chinese espionage services used telecommunications giant Huawei’s staff to get access codes to infiltrate a foreign network, the paper says.
The unnamed source said it was the first instance of privately held Huawei being used for national intelligence gathering. It was not known if it was successful. It was said to have taken place in the past two years.
The Australian Government has not made public its reason for banning Huawei gear from 5G mobile networks.
However, beyond Huawei’s alleged track record, Australian Strategic Policy Institute cyber expert Dannielle Cave said China passed its National Intelligence Law last year, which obliged citizens and organisations to co-operate with and collaborate with China’s intelligence services if required. That put even good companies in an impossible situation, she said.
Asked about the Australian report, Spark managing director Simon Moutter said his opinion had not changed since Friday, when he mounted a fired-up defence of the Chinese company, saying our Government must table “incontrovertible proof” of Huawei’s involvement in espionage or allow the Chinese company to bid for 5G business.
Huawei NZ deputy chief executive Andrew Bowater referred the NZ Herald to comments made by one of his colleagues across the Tasman who called the Australian’s story “more tired, unsubstantiated comments from anonymous sources”.
Huawei Australia head of corporate affairs Jeremy Mitchell said Australian security agencies had declined invitations to visit its headquarters in China and inspect its processes. He noted that rival vendors of 5G technology, Ericsson and Nokia, sourced their hardware from China in joint venture with state-owned enterprises.
GCSB Minister Andrew Little and Communications Minister Kris Faafoi are still considering whether to ban Huawei from bidding for Spark, Vodafone and 2degrees respective 5G mobile network upgrades, expected to go live in early 2020.
Little has emphasised that New Zealand will make its own decision, independent of Australian thinking.
And on Friday Bowater told the Herald that Huawei will not bid for “core” 5G network business, giving Nokia and Ericsson a clear run.
In broad terms, the core is the “brain” of a mobile network.
Huawei will restrict itself to bidding for RAN (radio access network) elements of Spark, Vodafone and 2degrees’ respective mobile upgrades — that is, transmitting and receiving gear on cellphone towers.