Friday, October 18, 2013

Phone Companies and the U.S.

Something is fishy here, and I can't help but feel like it's not Huawei. The United States, for a while now, has denied Huawei access to the US mobile market, and the company is continuously attempting to be allowed access.

First, a little background. Huawei is a Chinese networking and telecommunications company. It is also the largest telecommunications equipment maker in the world. Partners of Huawei include 80% of the world's top 50 telecoms companies. Just to name a few, these include: Vodafone, Motorola, T-Mobile, and Bell Canada.

Apparently, the Unites States finds cyber security issues a major concern when dealing with the foreign company. As of currently Huawei does not have access to the entirety of the United States market. The company states that it wishes to resolve these concerns.

Huawei has been fighting to gain full access to markets around the world, such as the United States and Australia. To attempt to address these security concerns, the company has been very forthcoming with its approaches to security, and has interest in having government and industry standards documented.

Part of the supposed United States concern is the idea that Chinese intelligence agencies could tamper with these telecoms for spying. They also fear that the company may willingly or be forced to share knowledge of our telecoms systems with the Chinese government. Last I heard, they weren't exactly the most agreeable group to privacy. Nonetheless, Huawei defends itself, stating that they have never run in to a situation where they were instructed to provide information to the government or their agencies. Of course, they haven't had much access, and I imagine it wouldn't be long after a proper implementation that it would happen.

Regardless, I'm not surprised the government is refusing a mobile company access to the United States market. Somehow, I feel they haven't been very forthcoming with the REAL reasons why aren't allowing it though. Chances are, they could care less about the company being Chinese, and their security is likely more than sufficient. My belief is that they likely just don't want the competition. Our current major mobile companies have a good thing going, and are boning the public for all they're worth. If a cheaper, better, Chinese company came in, it's a guarantee that the competition would drive them into much more reasonable pricing zones; and they don't want to be reasonable, they want to be rich.

Another possibility is that the respective countries simply don't want to be known for doing telecommunications business with a country that largely censors, filters, and monitors their own telecoms. The Unites States public isn't always exactly the brightest of groups, and would likely have a fit due to their own assumptions and ignorance. It's a lot easier not to deal with the misunderstandings and the smudged image. It could possibly be like every public relations department's worst nightmares.

It's a shame we likely won't be getting Huawei in the United States any time soon. From what I've heard, they're a great mobile company. Of course, we all know how crap our own are, so the change of pace could have been nice in the stagnant mobile service market. Oh well. Maybe AT&T will finally stop being jerks about phone exclusivity and multi-banding.....or not.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-10-17/huawei-sees-resolution-of-u-dot-s-dot-security-concern-taking-a-decade
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huawei

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