After months of uncertainty, the UK appears set to allow Huawei’s telecoms equipment to be part of the country’s 5G networks – with some limitations.
The move would put the UK at odds with the US, which has been pressing other nations to ban use of the Chinese firm’s kit on security grounds.
It could also cause tensions with Australia, which last year blocked its networks from using Huawei’s 5G gear.
The country also barred another Chinese firm, ZTE.
While Theresa May is reportedly willing to give Huawei the green light, this would not mean the prime minister’s cyber-advisers have disregarded the threat of a future Chinese cyber-attack.
That concern still preoccupies many security officials’ minds, since much of our critical infrastructure – from power stations to automated transport – is likely to be dependent on the next-generation communications technology.
Rather, there is a belief that restricting Huawei’s equipment to certain parts of the UK’s network means that the risk can be managed.
At the heart of the matter, there seems to be a critical disagreement: Canberra and Washington believe that there are fundamental differences between 5G and 4G, which mean an outright ban is the wiser choice.
To make sense of all this, it is worth exploring first why Australia came to its conclusion.
But it is worth saying up front that, for its part, Huawei has denied it would ever compromise a client’s network because it had been ordered to do so by Beijing.
It has said that it has been “targeted by a sustained campaign of ill-informed accusations that its involvement in 5G infrastructure somehow poses a threat”.