My opinion is that the gullible masses are deliberately lead to thinking that only telecommunication equipment has security risks while in fact, the biggest security risk is the operating system software we use in our computers and smartphones where the encryptions of our data actually take place. It's crazy that we take for granted our personal data (banking, financial etc.) is safe every time we update the O/S software in our computers and smartphones (when we are prompt to do so at any time) while on the other hand, we are being influenced into griping about the telecommunication equipment that does not in any way involve in the encryption and decryption of data.
Huawei Crackdown Exposes Europe as Laggard in Global 5G Race
Their lobbying exposes a weakness: Europe hasn’t been at the forefront on 5G, even before the Trump administration began
allies to block Huawei over concerns that the Chinese government could use its equipment for spying, which the company has repeatedly denied.
“The risk is that it puts Europe further behind the curve,” said Neil Campling, an analyst at Mirabaud Securities in London.
Britain has been considering whether to block Huawei’s equipment from 5G or keep managing it through dialogue and oversight. A full ban is unlikely, a British official
last month, speaking on condition of anonymity, and the U.K.’s spy chief said on Friday that barring Huawei might not be
.
While Europe led the way with earlier mobile technologies, China, South Korea, Japan and -- to a lesser extent -- the U.S., are ahead on the next rollouts.
5G Race
China's on track for more 5G subscribers than Western Europe, U.S combined
Despite beating the drum for 5G, which promises gigabit-per-second download speeds -- 10 times faster than 4G and at a lower cost to carriers -- European telecom executives are expected to be relatively
to invest for fear the spending won’t pay off for a long time.
European carriers are generally less profitable and regulators have blocked mergers that would allow a patchwork of operators to scale up. The spectrum needed for 5G hasn’t all been assigned yet and governments are set to tap them for billions of euros at
in the coming year.
Huawei is deeply embedded in Europe’s telecom networks, so restrictions could be more disruptive than in other places. In the U.S., the industry has generally avoided Huawei under government pressure. The Chinese government, far from limiting its telecom vendors facing global scrutiny, may dictate a faster 5G deployment to back Huawei and ZTE Corp., analysts at New Street Research said last month.
“The U.S. and China are actually in a good place, because one has never allowed Huawei and one is agnostic to it,” said Guy Peddy, an analyst at Macquarie.
Huawei has come from almost nowhere in Europe a decade ago to supply about a third of telecom systems. It’s positioned itself to be a critical provider of antennas, switches, routers, small cells and network slicing gear for 5G by conducting trials with carriers. The company has been helped by security agencies that opened the door while closely monitoring its equipment.
That cautious acceptance is now in question as governments realize how hard it will be to police 5G. With 4G networks, data is usually channeled through a central core, or “brain,” whereas in 5G, it will be processed and sent between multiple points in a more scattered arrangement that could make it harder to spot weaknesses and hacks.
In Germany, one idea considered last month at a meeting of network operators and government officials was to give state security full access to the source code of suppliers including Huawei, Ericsson AB and Cisco Systems Inc., according to a person briefed on a meeting, who asked not to be identified as the deliberations were private.
If the oversight proposals fail and Huawei is banned from 5G, Deutsche Telekom is
a two-year delay, according to an internal paper written in recent weeks. A person at another major European phone company, asking not to be identified, said barring Huawei would delay its 5G launch by 18 months.
With the outlook murky, carriers in the region don’t appear ready to abandon Huawei. BT is ramping up building its 5G network assuming Huawei will be involved, while studying contingency options that could include relying more on other suppliers, said a person involved in the planning. A spokeswoman for BT declined to comment.
Made in China
Chinese wireless technology is winning in Europe, the Middle East and Africa
One concern is the testing and costs tied to making 5G gear from Huawei’s European rivals Nokia Oyj and Ericsson compatible with its 4G kit. Carriers also see Ericsson and Nokia as being about a year behind on 5G product development, said Macquarie’s Peddy.
Nokia and Ericsson
Huawei doesn’t have a product edge and that they both are already deploying 5G equipment. Ericsson Chief Executive Officer Borje Ekholm, in a blog
, said Europe isn’t moving as quickly as other markets because of the lack of spectrum, high spectrum fees and heavy regulation. Eric Mangan, a Nokia spokesman, said the Finnish company can upgrade 4G equipment from any vendor to 5G.
The nightmare scenario for phone companies would be if they have to remove existing Huawei 4G gear. While some analysts see that as unlikely, Deutsche Telekom has flagged the risk: In its internal note, it put the cost of a retroactive ban at many billions of euros.
That “would seriously disrupt the whole mobile ecosystem,” Stockholm-based consultant Bengt Nordstrom said in an interview.
