
Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China - jbegley
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/15/business/huawei-ban-trump.html
======
petschge
The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at
all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility"
incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to
security problems.

~~~
Alupis
I don't really see the fear mongering or problem here.

This executive order would forbid the government from purchasing and
installing Telecom/Networking equipment that would be considered to have a
higher than acceptable risk.

Given that China isn't exactly the most friendly nation to the US, and given
Huawei is by nature, an extension of the Chinese Government, it's not
unreasonable to assume China might at some point in the future (or already is)
use Huawei to conduct electronic espionage against other nations.

Just like it wouldn't be unreasonable for China to forbid purchase and use of
Cisco equipment within the Chinese government.

(We should also not forget or excuse Chinese IP theft which has enabled Huawei
to produce competitive products in the first place...)

~~~
chrisco255
Maybe that's our fault for outsourcing all of our semiconductor production to
China. We got cheap electronics out of the deal, but we've lost a lot of
expertise in manufacturing as a result.

~~~
deepnotderp
We don't outsource semiconductor production to China, China actually currently
lacks leading edge semiconductor capabilities

~~~
jessaustin
I don't buy into _all_ of this anti-sinitic paranoia, but if suspicion of
China-produced semiconductors were reasonable, why wouldn't suspicion of
Taiwan-produced semiconductors also be reasonable?

~~~
tatersolid
Because Taiwan is a democracy on our side, and they’re just as suspicious of
the Chinese Communists as good old ‘Mercia?

~~~
jessaustin
I can't imagine why Taiwan would be suspicious of any of the kingdoms of the
Heptarchy, or indeed of any polity that hasn't existed in over a millennium.

If you have a good reason to suspect that state-level attackers could be in
your supply chain, that reason doesn't go away just because the semiconductors
were actually manufactured in Taiwan. Do we imagine that China's spooks don't
have access to Taiwan fabs? Do we imagine that USA's spooks don't? If this is
an actual threat to you, you need a lot more assurance than a "Made in Taiwan"
label.

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mark_l_watson
A little off topic: I think multiple countries should join together to co-
sponsor security evaluation labs to check Cisco, Huawei, and all telecom
companies. These labs should get access to hardware design, software, etc.
This can be done in a way that mostly protects individual company’s
intellectual property.

I suspect that the top telecom tech companies would go along with this idea,
to get vetted, if it would help increase their business. Right now there are
two European and one Chinese company who can ship 5G gear. I would like all
5G, and older gear also, to be vetted by international security labs.

~~~
theNJR
Sort of like UN weapons inspects?

~~~
dylan604
I like that. If we are using vocabulary like Cyber Warfare, Cyber Attacks, and
even now seeing actual bombs blowing up buildings as a retaliation of a cyber
attack, then why not. Who would be the Scott Ritter of the cyber world?
Although, the only people that I'd trust to understand the equipment are the
exact people I wouldn't trust with my equipment! ;-)

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bogomipz
"Foreign Telecom Gear" really only ever seems to mean Huawei and China in
these proclamations.

The fact is the majority of Telecom gear is foreign-made with regards to the
US. To wit:

Alcatel-Lucent - France

Nokia - Finland

Siemens - Germany

Samsung - Korea

Fujitsu and NEC - Japan

If the US were to truly enforce a domestic US-only vendor selection it would
be limited to Cienna, Cisco, Qualcomm and Motorola. And to my knowledge none
of those four companies are making 5G switching gear.

~~~
HillaryBriss
isn't all this stuff actually manufactured in China?

~~~
culot
Depends on the component or product probably. Some is, some isn't.

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elamje
Is there major legitimacy to the state sponsored back doors in Huawei, or has
the company just become some sort of pawn in the trade war?

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burtonator
I'm really looking forward to a time with the United States, Russia, and China
all agree to get along and decide to screw all the poor people equally instead
of just trying to screw poor people in their own country.

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samirm
This in addition to all the "security" advisories to other countries seems
like a move to curb their economic growth more than anything.

~~~
mschuster91
For once in 2 years though the current US admin is right IMHO. China is not an
ally, Russia is not an ally. Best case they're semi-neutral, worst case
they're the next enemy.

China especially has been playing the ultra-long game by slowly getting more
and more countries under their dependence, buying up assets left and right and
where that didn't help resorting to industrial espionage.

The problem that the telco operators have is that there is (thanks to Chinese
dumping, did I mention they are playing a long game) next to no viable
competition in either the US or the expanded NATO space - Europe has Ericsson
and Nokia which are expensive and the US has Cisco which is expensive and
crops up with at least one real backdoor a month.

~~~
wobblegong
Are hardware vulnerabilities so difficult to find and insidious that no amount
of auditing and investigation by the US govt will ever be sufficient?

~~~
kevin_nisbet
Pretty much yes, combined with having to fully audit the software top to
bottom every couple of weeks for every patch, piece of firmware, etc with
pressure to get into production fixes for issues that affect customers
service.

From my experience in the industry, most of the protections being offered are
hand-wavy things, like a software patch from Huawei being scanned by a desktop
virus scanner for viruses or remote access gateways that record the screens of
external employees accessing equipment where the demo I got for the solution
the security prime couldn't figure out how to actually view the screen
recordings. Huawei employees weren't allowed to give us any USB devices
either. (I didn't work with Huawei routinely, although I know many who do. I
tended to work with Cisco, Nokia, and several smaller vendors).

The only model I could see sort of working is forcing them to hand over the
sources to an industry group or government entity, that is then responsible
for auditing, building, and signing the software. But there are so many moving
components slipping something past that is still plausible, and many barriers
towards that sort of model.

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stunt
This huge international campaign including pushing other countries..! It is
not about security. It is more about money. Huge influence from powerful
capitalists and investors because their market and long term interests are at
risk.

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robertAngst
Can anyone stop him?

I don't want him to do this. I don't want these tariffs.

Does this mean the Republican Party is compliant in this nonsense?

~~~
swebs
I, on the other hand, am glad these tariffs are happening. They've been a long
time coming.

~~~
gscott
I agree. We can't control China's behavior but the tariffs do a good job of
controlling our own behavior since they punish us more then China. So if you
are single sourcing everything in China you will be punished more then those
who have more sources. Challenge is the next President will back right off and
we will be where we were before.

~~~
criddell
I'm not sure I support the wider set of tariffs (I really don't know a lot
about the impact of that), but I totally support the banning of buying major
telecom equipment from foreign countries.

------
cletus
This just goes to prove that even a racist clock is right twice a day [1]
because it's clear that:

\- China has engaged in state-sponsored corporate and military espionage; and

\- Chinese companies are not separate from the state.

The only reasonable conclusion here is that Huawei gear on key networking
infrastructure represents a security threat and really that's all there is to
it. I find it odd that it's taken Trump, who otherwise is a disaster on pretty
much every front, to actually say what is otherwise obvious.

[1]: [https://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/the-racist-
clock-4...](https://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/the-racist-clock-4th-
panel)

~~~
bvdba
I don't believe this is the consequence of Trump being racist.

~~~
deertick1
I don't believe trump is racist.

~~~
krapp
There is a lot of circumstantial evidence to suggest that he is[0,1], going
back to lawsuits over housing discrimination in the 1970s, to his comments
about wanting more immigrants from Norway rather than "shithole countries" in
Africa, and of course equivocating on Charlottesville.

Granted, he hasn't burned a cross on the White House lawn, but it's difficult
to look at his statements and the unprecedented (and well documented) support
his campaign had from racists and not conclude he probably is racist beyond a
reasonable doubt.

[0][https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/trump-r...](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/trump-
racism-comments/588067/)

[1][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_views_of_Donald_Trump](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_views_of_Donald_Trump)

~~~
m0zg
Charlottesville hoax has been debunked again and again, including by MSM
outlets themselves. Read what he actually said:
[https://blog.dilbert.com/2019/04/30/the-fine-people-hoax-
fun...](https://blog.dilbert.com/2019/04/30/the-fine-people-hoax-funnel/)

~~~
krapp
Ok fair enough. That still leaves the rest of the mountain of evidence. Is
every quote and statement ever made by and about Trump also a hoax? Even the
ones from prior to his presidency?

~~~
m0zg
Prior to his presidency here's how things were "racism" wise:
[https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+with+sharpton&newwindo...](https://www.google.com/search?q=trump+with+sharpton&newwindow=1&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjfqIfB757iAhXEMnwKHV0kDYUQ_AUIDigB&biw=2048&bih=1070).
Dude even had a black girflriend for a couple of years:
[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/us/politics/trump-
blacks-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/us/politics/trump-blacks-
african-americans-girlfriend-charlottesville.html)

As to "mountains of evidence", up until you've read the article I linked, you
thought there was "mountain of evidence" about Charlottesville, too. Heck, you
probably still think that, this particular bit of fake news has been drilled
into everyone's skulls relentlessly for over a year.

What makes you think that other "evidence" is not of the same quality?

~~~
krapp
One article from which that first picture was taken[0] suggests other than the
narrative you want to present:

    
    
        Today, the two are at opposite ends of the political spectrum. In 
        the interview last December, Trump said on Fox that Sharpton “is 
        a guy who I don’t believe really believes what he’s saying.”
    
        And Sharpton has used his MSNBC and radio shows to criticize Trump, 
        arguing that his stances on Barack Obama’s birth certificate 
        and the Central Park Five were racist.
    
    

And here's another one[1] where Al Sharpton out and out calls Trump a racist.

So that leaves the fact that he one dated a black woman as your evidence to
disprove everything else?

H.P. Lovecraft was a racist and virulent antisemite, and yet he still married
a Jewish woman. Racists are not racist about everything, all the time, like
cartoon characters, and where people like Trump are concerned, obviously class
status also has an effect on the way race is viewed.

Not terribly convincing.

[0][https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/09/trumps-pal-al-
sharpto...](https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/09/trumps-pal-al-sharpton/)

[1][https://www.huffpost.com/entry/al-sharpton-donald-trump-
raci...](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/al-sharpton-donald-trump-
racist_n_5cc981aee4b0913d078b02fd)

>Heck, you probably still think that, this particular bit of fake news has
been drilled into everyone's skulls relentlessly for over a year.

Now you're resorting to personal attacks, so this conversation is over.

~~~
m0zg
Of course Sharpton will call him a "racist" _now_. Not doing so would subject
him to intense repercussions as a democrat, his career would be over in an
instant.

But Trump is the dude literally _nobody_ had any problems with until he ran
against HRC, including the likes of Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, etc. He
received the Rosa Parks award fer chrissakes: [https://www.snopes.com/fact-
check/trump-received-ellis-islan...](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-
received-ellis-island-award-in-1986/)

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EamonnMR
What is this gonna mean for my OnePlus

~~~
gbear605
Nothing, unless your cellphone is part of the infrastructure of a telecom
company.

