UK lawmakers have long had some problems with the partnership that has been forged between Huawei and BT. The government is starting to get quite a bit more vocal about their reservations in the month of June. Late last week, the government talked about how they were somewhat untrusting of the collaboration. Now the UK is being quite a bit more verbose, saying that that partnership has actually exposed some flawed security controls.
Specifically, the government is saying that Huwaei should not have been allowed to be embedded in Great Britain’s communications network without the knowledge or investigation of lawmakers. The Chinese company is coming under greater scrutiny after numerous reports of Chinese hackers causing problems across the globe. It appears that the UK feels as though they have left themselves very vulnerable to a pretty major attack.
Huwaei has a multi-billion dollar deal with BT to supply that company with various pieces of equipment. The deal has actually stretched back to 2005, long before worries about state endorsed hackers were even on Britain’s radar. BT Group is Britain’s largest telecommunications company and that is where the worries really stem from.
Apparently, BT had actually told government officials of the intent to form a partnership with Huawei two years before the deal took place. The real problem is that those government officials apparently did not pass the information on to the government’s ministers until after the contract was signed and in effect. The officials not passing on the information has apparently led to a feeling of “shock” in parliament.
A former office in the People’s Liberation Army runs Huawei and this appears to be part of the concern from the UK. For its part, the United States has also been taking longer looks at contracts that the Chinese company has forged with firms inside the US.
Huawei released a brief statement after the UK government’s concerns were raised, simply saying that it hopes to expand business contacts inside Britain.
