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Re: [LUG] NSA's backdoor catalog exposed

 

> On 30 Dec 2013, at 17:29, Paul Sutton <zleap@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> So without Jumping to any conclusions :-
> 
> 1 A country with internet censorship (China)
> 2 A Chinese company
> 3. Internet spying and this company has been cited as being involved

No, this company has been cited here as one for whom an Intelligence agency has a 
way in to some of their kit. There is no implication that Huawei were complicit in 
this. I think it highly unlikely that Huawei would be complicit in aiding Western 
intelligence other than making kit wiretap ready as the US government requires for 
such kit in the US.

Huawei have a fairly difficult time with the US. The allegation is they might back 
door kit, but the CESG say their kit is clean. As such I suspect it is being used as 
an excuse to exclude Chinese competition in the US market.

>From what I can tell Huawei kit isn't great security-wise in the telecoms market, 
>but it is cheap and improving fast. A lot of UK networks are using Huawei kit.

I have some quarms about dealing with China, but they are all to do with workers 
rights and conditions and apply to a lot of electronics, not just those carrying a 
Chinese company name.

> 4. A company who is now in charge of Internet filtering

Big telecoms companies tend to be soulless beasts, I'm all for reforming this, but I 
think picking out Huawei because they won the contract may reflect a certain 
xenophobia. Companies that bid and lost would be equally morally culpable just less 
efficient.

I believe Symantec held the TalkTalk contract prior to Huawei taking over. So I 
assume you have a similar level of suspicion of them.

Cisco and Juniper helped build the great firewall of China. Cisco should probably be 
top of your suspects list.
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