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the firm says. A subsequent FBI investigation con-
cluded it had been attacked with a high-powered
laser in an apparent attempt to reverse- engineer it.
For Akhan CEO Adam Khan, who has invested
$6 million since 2007 to hone the technology, the
alleged theft was “extremely disappointing” and has
national- security implications owing to his technol-
ogy’s military applications. “I would encourage the
U.S. government to keep Huawei at arm’s length,”
he says, adding that “many, many” inventors have
shared similar allegations. Criminal and civil cases
against Huawei related to the alleged theft are on-
going. Ren denies his firm steals technology, insist-
ing he “highly respects intellectual-property rights.”
As well as stealing, there are also allegations of
espionage attempts. In January, police in Poland ar-
rested Huawei employee Wang Weijing and a Polish
national on suspicion of spying. Huawei fired Wang,
and Ren tells TIME that “all employees must not
violate local laws and regulations.” Asked whether
he is loyal to the CCP, of which he is a member, Ren
replies, “I am loyal to my customers.”
Huawei has long been accused of leaving secret
vulnerabilities or “back doors” in its software and
hardware that would permit illicit access to private
data. In 2018, the French newspaper Le Monde re-
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ported that the African Union headquarters in Addis
Ababa, whose Huawei- built IT system was a gift
from the Chinese government, was hacked, thanks
to deliberate vulnerabilities. Huawei and China
have denied responsibility for the breach.
Ren says he would rather disband his company
and go to prison than install back doors in Huawei
technology. To betray his customers, he says, risks
having to repay billions of dollars in bank loans on his
own. “Comparatively, I think going to jail is better.”
The U.S. has so far been unable to prove there are
deliberate back doors in Huawei-built tech. But a re-
port in March from an oversight board of the U.K.’s
National Cyber Security Centre alleged flaws in
Huawei’s software products “that cause significant
cyber security and availability risks.” Although the
U.K. report found no evidence the vulnerabilities
were the result of Chinese state interference, U.S. in-
telligence officials believe there is no doubt that Chi-
nese intelligence has both knowledge of the flaws
and sufficient access to exploit them. The greatest
danger, Principal Deputy Director of National Intel-
ligence Sue Gordon tells TIME, lies not just in the
hardware Huawei and other Chinese firms sell, but
also in the software they run, for example the code
used in routine security updates.
It’s little wonder, then, that the U.S. is using its
powers of persuasion to drive a wedge between Hua-
wei and the rest of the world—not altogether suc-
cessfully. The E.U.’s executive body rejected U.S.
calls for a ban in March. On April 24, after months
of indecision, the British government decided to
permit Huawei to be used for peripheral 5G equip-
ment while banning it from core infrastructure.
NEXT- Pompeo slammed the decision, which divided Prime
GENERATION
Minister Theresa May’s Cabinet. “Why would any-
EVOLUTION
one grant such power to a regime that has already
grossly violated cyberspace?” he said on May 8.
In Germany, U.S. Ambassador Richard Grenell
told the country’s Economy Minister in a letter
dated March 7 that the U.S. would limit intelligence
1G sharing unless Germany banned Chinese firms from
1980s its 5G networks. That threat appears to have stiff-
Insecure, ened German resolve not to legislate against Hua-
low-quality wei; two weeks later, Chancellor Angela Merkel said
mobile calls she did not believe in singling out a company “sim-
use analog ply because it is from a certain country.” Still, Ger-
signals
man officials say they are not naive about the risks of
handing this market to China. Merkel’s Foreign and
2G Interior Ministers urged her to lock Chinese firms
out of the 5G rollout last fall.
1990s
The cost of saying no to Washington could be
A new digital more than allies think, experts say. Countries who
era enables use Huawei may find they are no longer able to in-
text messages tegrate American weapons systems and platforms,
and early
making it harder to carry out joint training and se-
email curity cooperation with the U.S. “The impact to
HD MOVIE military and intelligence cooperation could further
TIME 1 corrode already strained U.S.-allied relationships,”
hour says Timothy Heath, a former analyst at U.S. Pacific
3G Command now at Rand Corp.
But cutting out China could present a threat too.
2000s After New Zealand barred Huawei from 5G, Beijing
Carriers offer unleashed economic warfare in apparent retalia-
data plans for tion, discouraging tourism, delaying seafood im-
web surfing ports and even turning back an Air New Zealand
and video jetliner bound for Shanghai after onboard paper-
streaming
work referenced self-governing Taiwan as an inde-
2 pendent country.
min. And when Canada agreed in December to arrest
Ren’s daughter, Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, on be-
4G half of U.S. prosecutors seeking her extradition for
2010s alleged sanctions contraventions, China leapt into
action. The government detained 13 Canadian citi-
Faster
zens, charged two with espionage and put another
networks
support video two on death row for drug offenses.
chat and Ren says the charges against his daughter are base-
media sharing less and politically motivated, and her portrait occu-
pies pride of place in his cluttered office. He denies
4
sec. the government’s actions prove Huawei and the state
are in cahoots. “It is right for the Chinese government
to protect its citizens,” says Ren. “Especially an ex-
5G ecutive of a large company arrested for no reason.”
2020s
he U.S. feUd with Huawei risks bifurcating
The next T 5G’s rollout into two distinct blocs—nations
generation that embrace Chinese 5G and those that re-
promises to be ject it wholesale—hampering global connectivity
exponentially
faster and hurting the bottom lines of companies forced
to choose. Technology consultant Stephanie Hare
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