US intelligence services discourage Americans from buying Huawei and ZTE phonestelefoon

The directors of six different US intelligence agencies, including the FBI, CIA and NSA, said in a hearing that they would not advise Americans to purchase products or services from Huawei or ZTE.

FBI Director Chris Wray said in a hearing with the United States Senate Intelligence Committee that he is deeply concerned about the risks of giving companies access to US telecommunications networks when those companies have obligations to foreign governments that are not share American values. According to him, this could lead to the capacity to forge or steal information and to undetectable espionage, CNBC reports.

In response, Huawei said the company poses no greater internet security risk than any other IT contractor. A spokesperson for the Chinese telecom company pointed out that Huawei is trusted by governments and customers in 170 countries.

During the hearing, intelligence chiefs praised US providers who previously resisted Chinese companies from selling their products. For example, provider AT&T canceled the sale of the Mate 10 Pro smartphone and Verizon would also have refrained from selling Huawei smartphones. Richard Yu, the director of Huawei’s consumer products division, expressed his dissatisfaction in January with the lack of these sales deals.

These steps by the American carriers would in any case be related to the earlier rumor that American politicians in the US have put pressure on the carriers to cancel deals with Huawei. The politicians are concerned that Huawei has too close ties with the Chinese government and that the phones could be used for espionage. Earlier it appeared that the US government is working on a bill that should make it impossible to use telecom equipment from Huawei and ZTE within government institutions.