A leading Chinese telecommunications company has opened a Cyber Security Transparency Center in the capital of the European Union in a bid to counter American warnings that the tech giant is an espionage threat.
“Trust in cybersecurity is one of the major challenges that we face as a global community,” Huawei deputy chairman Ken Hu said Tuesday in Brussels. “We believe that this is an effective model to build trust for the digital era.”
U.S. officials regard Huawei, and the Chinese telecommunications industry in general, with suspicion, given its ties to the ruling Communist Party and government mandates requiring it to cooperate with Beijing’s spy services. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has launched an international campaign to discourage allies — especially in Europe, Huawei’s biggest market outside China — from partnering with the company.
“They’ll steal American technology and, frankly, use those systems to invade your privacy,” Pompeo said Monday during an appearance in Iowa. “Huawei is owned by the state of China and has deep connections to their intelligence service. That should send off flares for everybody who understands what the Chinese military and Chinese intelligence services do. We have to take that threat seriously.”
Huawei is a major smartphone manufacturer and the largest provider of infrastructure for much-anticipated high-speed 5G networks. The White House has drafted an executive order that would ban Chinese equipment from U.S. telecommunications networks, but President Trump has not signed it.
Communist officials deny claims that the regime uses telecom companies to spy on Western entities, arguing that the Trump administration is using national security concerns as an excuse to hurt a major Chinese business in the midst of a trade war. Canada’s arrest of Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, in Vancouver on a U.S. warrant late last year widened the dispute to America’s northern neighbor. Canada announced last week that it would begin extradition proceedings against Meng, who would face trial in the United States for violating sanctions on Iran.
The Huawei official said yesterday that the new center in Brussels will counter American arguments by “showcas[ing] Huawei’s end-to-end cybersecurity practices.” The company intends to “facilitate communication between Huawei and key stakeholders on cybersecurity strategies,” in addition to providing a platform for “product security testing.” That platform would allow European wireless companies to examine the source code behind Huawei’s equipment.
“We welcome all regulators, standards organizations, and customers to fully use this platform to collaborate more closely on security standards, verification mechanisms, and security technology innovation,” Hu said.
U.S. officials scorn such offers from Chinese and Russian officials, judging them to be “entirely insincere” given the array of cybersecurity threats emanating from those nations.
“Their primary goal is to protect their own ability to hack and intrude and steal Western data,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., told the Washington Examiner last week.
