Last Thursday, the EU industry chief Thierry Breton urged more EU countries to ban 5G network equipment from China’s Huawei and ZTE.
Breton has voiced his concerns in the past few weeks about some EU countries having perceived the high-risk components in their 5G network and citing intrusive third-country laws regarding national intelligence and data security — a clear reference to China.
Two years ago, the EU adopted guidelines to push its 27 members to assess the risk profile of their suppliers on a national or EU level and ban high-risk suppliers of 5G core equipment on their networks.
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“To date, only 10 of them have used these prerogatives to restrict or exclude high-risk vendors. This is too slow, and it poses a major security risk and exposes the Union’s collective security since it creates a major dependency for the EU and serious vulnerabilities,” Breton said.
He added that the 10 EU countries who decided to block Huawei and ZTE were “justified” and in line with their 5G guidelines.
Germany is still examining Chinese equipment in its 5G network while Portugal has already signed a resolution that could prevent telecoms from using Chinese components for 4G and 5G networks.
The Chinese government, Huawei, and ZTE have been long-time rejecting the United States’ allegations that they are using network equipment for spying other countries.
EU will also restrict both Chinese companies from its own procurement of telco services.
Source: Reuters