INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Huawei had a rough go of it here in the States, after concerns around ties to the Chinese government have left the company scrambling to
gain a commercial toehold
Over the past several years, top U.K
security officials have also put the company under the microscope over potential security concerns.
A new report issued by a government
panel with the straightforward name &Huawei Cyber Security Evaluation Centre& this week presents some fairly inconclusive
findings.
&Identification of shortcomings in Huawei engineering processes have exposed new risks in the UK telecommunication networks and
long-term challenges in mitigation and management,& the report notes, early on
&The Oversight Board can provide only limited assurance that any risks to UK national security from Huawei involvement in the UK critical
networks have been sufficiently mitigated.&
Sure, it not as damning as the time theFBI, CIA and NSA issued a bold proclamation against
buying from the company, but it certainly leaves the door open for further scrutiny
For its part, Huawei actually seems pretty pleased with the report
The company offered TechCrunch the following statement in response:
Huawei welcomes the Oversight Board report
It confirms the collaborative approach adopted by Huawei, the UK Government and operators is working as designed, meeting obligations and
providing unique, world class network integrity assurance through ongoing risk management
The report concludes that HCSEC operational independence is both robust and effective
The Oversight Board has identified some areas for improvement in our engineering processes
We are grateful for this feedback and committed to addressing these issues
Cyber security remains Huawei top priority, and we will continue to actively improve our engineering processes and risk management
systems.
The report flags a pair of issues relating to testing and third-party software used in some Huawei hardware
government National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) says it is working with Huawei to address the concerns.
