Huawei staff share deep links with Chinese military, new study claims

CNBC ^ | Mon, Jul 8 2019 1:24 AM EDT | Arjun Kharpal

[Zhang Fei]

A new analysis of CVs of Huawei staff appeared to reveal deeper links between the technology giant and China’s military and intelligence bodies than had been previously acknowledged by the firm.

The paper, which looks at employment records of Huawei employees, concluded that “key mid-level technical personnel employed by Huawei have strong backgrounds in work closely associated with intelligence gathering and military activities.” Some employees can be linked “to specific instances of hacking or industrial espionage conducted against Western firms,” it claimed.

The study may heighten concerns among governments who are analyzing claims that Huawei poses a national security risk. Some countries are worried that Huawei could install so-called backdoors in its telecommunications networking equipment that would allow the Chinese government to access user data. Huawei has repeatedly denied it would ever engage in such activity.

The study, conducted by Christopher Balding, an associate professor at Fulbright University Vietnam, and London-based conservative think tank Henry Jackson Society, looked through CVs of Huawei employees that were leaked online from unsecured databases and websites run by recruitment firms.

One CV appeared to show a person who simultaneously held a position at Huawei and a teaching and research role at a military university through which they were employed by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. Balding linked that employee to a section in the PLA that is responsible for the Chinese military’s space, cyber, and electronic warfare capabilities.

“The circumstantial evidence appears quite strong to support valid concerns about the relationship between Huawei, the PLA, and concerns about intelligence gathering,” Balding said in the paper.

Another CV describes an individual who worked at Huawei but was a representative of a government entity responsible for espionage and counter intelligence. That individual “engaged in behavior that describes planting information capture technology or software on Huawei products,”

[Grimmy]

Huawei is a front for Chinese intelligence agency.

[Blurb2350]

[Pearls Before Swine]

Not on topic, but she IS big-boned. Like Cartman.

[Stevenc131]

[Farcesensitive]

Everything in China is part of the party, the military or the civilian government and it doesn’t make much difference which one.

[SauronOfMordor]

Is anyone really surprised?

[Blurb2350]

No kidding! That’s the actress Gabourey Sidibe who made such a huge splash (no pun intended) several years back in the movie “Precious.” She had gastric bypass surgery several years ago, but a Google image search suggests she’s still quite obese.

[Zhang Fei]

[Everything in China is part of the party, the military or the civilian government and it doesn’t make much difference which one.]

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Actually, 3/4 of Chinese economic output is generated by privately-owned businesses. Huawei’s just not one of them.

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https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/state-owned-enterprises-are-hard-habit-china-doesnt-want-break
While China’s SOEs remain strong, decades of market reform have dramatically reduced their role in China’s economy. Their share of the gross domestic product fell from more than 50 percent to 25 percent in just 15 years; and they account for only 5 percent of industrial enterprises today, compared with 18 percent in 2003. Nonetheless, the significance of the state sector has strengthened.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratfor

[Farcesensitive]

Those “private industries” are all owned by party members who were given the money to start them by the party or who are allowed to remain in business (and alive) by the party and are required to support party and state policy.

“Private industry” is an illusion in China.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Zhang Fei.

[Zhang Fei]

[Those “private industries” are all owned by party members who were given the money to start them by the party or who are allowed to remain in business (and alive) by the party and are required to support party and state policy.

“Private industry” is an illusion in China.]

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By definition, in an absolute dictatorship, a monarchy in all but name, no one gets to oppose the emperor’s edicts. But to say that private industries are financed or owned by party members is incorrect. The reality is that these parasites are first rate schemers and back-stabbers, but for the most part, no good at running businesses in a competitive environment. The remaining SOE’s have what amounts to implicit monopolies.

[Sam Gamgee]

Here in Canada Huawei devices are sold. Is Huawei basically out of business in the US?

[Magnatron]

Seriously??? This is news?

[Farcesensitive]

China is far more totalitarian and control freak than a simple dictatorship or monarchy, nobody is allowed to be successful unless they function as an extension of the party and the state.

[PIF]

Let’s see before this article came out it was know that all the research came out of the PLA; the founder and CEO was a high ranking PLA officer; the same CEO is now a high ranking member of the Communist Party of China. So there some major previously unknown revelation here?

[Zhang Fei]

[Seriously??? This is news?]

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Since you’re in the biz, maybe you could explain something I don’t understand about why some countries are letting their phone companies buy Huawei back office telco equipment. As I understand it, telco equipment runs off custom hardware and software that requires occasional updates as bugs are detected and fixed, just like any Windows PC. But given that both hardware and software are custom-made, it’s not easy to detect malware inserted just to relay data back to some home base at random intervals. And with software and firmware updates, it’s doubly difficult to ensure that even if the system did not start out with malware inserted by Huawei, it’s still free of malware going forward.

About 20 years after Window XP came out, Microsoft is still patching security problems, and these were inadvertently put in. How is it even possibly to discover elaborately camouflaged malware in Huawei telco systems? And how is any British government agency telling Theresa May that Huawei 5G telco equipment is not a security threat? My instinct is to think that these evaluators are either bought or incompetent. Am I wrong? Is there any universe in which letting your phone companies install Huawei telco equipment not amount to giving the Chinese government a look at all of your voice and data communications?

[usconservative]

Is there anyone who DOESN'T know this truth?

If so, the stupid bastards get what they deserve.

[Zhang Fei]

[Here in Canada Huawei devices are sold. Is Huawei basically out of business in the US?]

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Phones are still available. It’s back office telco equipment that’s banned. The idea being that the Chinese government can skim telco traffic for all kinds of secrets. We’ve done it before, so we know it works.

https://www.infoworld.com/article/2608141/snowden—the-nsa-planted-backdoors-in-cisco-products.html

That’s why I think Snowden should have been assassinated in public as a warning to future traitors. What he did was the equivalent of handing out the Enigma code cipher. A bullet in the brain would have been too humane.

[Grimmy]

MPAI (Most People Are Idiots)