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Huawei 5G kit must be removed from UK by 2027

(www.bbc.com)
293 points doener | 1 comments | 14 Jul 20 12:06 UTC | HN request time: 0.195s | source
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rich_sasha ◴[14 Jul 20 12:42 UTC] No.23831166[source]▶
If this is just Realpolitik/hardware independence, fine, but security..?

Any worthwhile Internet traffic should be encrypted in 2020, and if it isn’t, Huawei probably isn’t the most immediate concern.

And if it is encrypted, does it really matter who is listening?

Comments welcome, I know zilch about telecoms hardware.

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TheAdamAndChe ◴[14 Jul 20 12:48 UTC] No.23831214[source]▶
Your questions aren't about telecoms hardware, but about politics and the international flow of power. China is slated to take over the world economically. Their political model has the potential to spread around the world. These are attempts to limit China's capacity to grow as fast while inhibiting their capacity to knock out, intercept, or backdoor critical infrastructure.
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rich_sasha ◴[14 Jul 20 12:56 UTC] No.23831319[source]▶
Yeah, this I get and, well, sympathise in a way. There is no war, but an ongoing struggle for staying ahead economically, and if this is a part of it, at least there is a logic to it.

I’m asking, is there really a security risk that Huawei might listen in on telecoms. Is traffic at the low level more vulnerable somehow? Is it the prevalence of unencrypted communications? Is it leaking of metadata that people are worried about?

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1. lozf ◴[14 Jul 20 20:24 UTC] No.23837350[source]▶
There's more to it than merely listening in or gathering metadata. In the future we'll all be used to widespread 5G, and increasingly dependent on it - it's already commonly touted as enabling self-driving cars, IoT etc. and even replacing WiFi.

People are concerned that Huawei / the Chinese could effectively shut down important chunks of infrastructure that would cause chaos in a city like London, and many other places, and furtermore that the implied threat of such a mishap, might be used as a form of coercion.