The European Commission estimated that the Huawei and ZTE represent a security risk for the European Union in terms of 5G and announced that it would no longer subscribe to telephone services based on the equipment of these companies.
Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton asked the 27 member countries and telecom operators to exclude such equipment from their mobile networks. “We cannot afford to maintain dependencies that could become weapons against our interests. It would be too great a risk to our common security.”, he said in an interview.
The European executive considered in a statement that Huawei and ZTE “posed significantly greater risks than other 5G vendors”. The Commission added that it would “take the necessary security measures to not acquire new connectivity services based on equipment from these suppliers”.
Europe is under pressure from the United States to exclude these two Chinese groups accused of enabling spying activities on behalf of China. The United States has already banned the sale of equipment from five Chinese suppliers, including Huawei and ZTE. Bans on the supply of 5G equipment have also been taken in the UK and Canada, but European countries are divided on which approach to take.
In a “toolbox” adopted in January 2020, Member States and the Commission made recommendations aimed at protecting 5G networks in the European Union from the risks of espionage or sabotage. But these measures have no binding legal force, and high-risk vendors are not named. The latter are defined as manufacturers of equipment likely to be subject to interference by a third country, for example, due to the existence of a close connection with the government of that country or the legislation of the country, in particular where no protection agreement has been concluded. of data concluded with the EU.
Huawei and ZTE with complicated life in Europe
Three years later, 24 of the 27 EU Member States have transposed the recommendations of the toolkit to your national law. “But to date, only 10 of them have used these prerogatives to restrict or exclude high-risk suppliers. It is too slow and poses a major security risk and exposes the collective security of the Union.”, said Thierry Breton.
