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Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

nytimes.com

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Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#11

Post by mey »

petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

Watching from afar, the amount of huge holes in Cisco are staggering. I don't really understand IT's love of Cisco, other than that's all they've certed in/invested in/never get fired for IBM mentality. For people in the networking space, what makes you use cisco for firewalls/core routing at this point?

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#12

Post by Alupis »

petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

I don't really see the fear mongering or problem here.

This executive order would forbid the government from purchasing and installing Telecom/Networking equipment that would be considered to have a higher than acceptable risk.

Given that China isn't exactly the most friendly nation to the US, and given Huawei is by nature, an extension of the Chinese Government, it's not unreasonable to assume China might at some point in the future (or already is) use Huawei to conduct electronic espionage against other nations.

Just like it wouldn't be unreasonable for China to forbid purchase and use of Cisco equipment within the Chinese government.

(We should also not forget or excuse Chinese IP theft which has enabled Huawei to produce competitive products in the first place...)

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#13

Post by solotronics »

mschuster91 wrote: post #3
samirm wrote: post #2

This in addition to all the "security" advisories to other countries seems like a move to curb their economic growth more than anything.

For once in 2 years though the current US admin is right IMHO. China is not an ally, Russia is not an ally. Best case they're semi-neutral, worst case they're the next enemy. China especially has been playing the ultra-long game by slowly getting more and more countries under their dependence, buying up assets left and right and where that didn't help resorting to industrial espionage. The problem that the telco oper…

Are you talking specifically about 5G?

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#14

Post by petschge »

Alupis wrote: post #12
petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

I don't really see the fear mongering or problem here. This executive order would forbid the government from purchasing and installing Telecom/Networking equipment that would be considered to have a higher than acceptable risk. Given that China isn't exactly the most friendly nation to the US, and given Huawei is by nature, an extension of the Chinese Government, it's not unreasonable to assume China might at some po…

The government deciding to not purchase that equipment for their own use in sensitive networks is one thing. (And this was already in place before this executive order.)

Banning corporations from doing that in their own commercial networks is another thing (and that is what happens now).

And pressuring other countries (either via ambassadors or other venues) and threatening with sanctions when they come to their own conclusions is yet another thing again.

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#15

Post by khana »

Alupis wrote: post #12
petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

I don't really see the fear mongering or problem here. This executive order would forbid the government from purchasing and installing Telecom/Networking equipment that would be considered to have a higher than acceptable risk. Given that China isn't exactly the most friendly nation to the US, and given Huawei is by nature, an extension of the Chinese Government, it's not unreasonable to assume China might at some po…

Yes.

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#17

Post by mschuster91 »

wobblegong wrote: post #7
mschuster91 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For once in 2 years though the current US admin is right IMHO. China is not an ally, Russia is not an ally. Best case they're semi-neutral, worst case they're the next enemy. China especially has been playing the ultra-long game by slowly getting more and more countries under their dependence, buying up assets left and right and where that didn't help resorting to industrial espionage. The problem that the telco oper…

Are hardware vulnerabilities so difficult to find and insidious that no amount of auditing and investigation by the US govt will ever be sufficient?

Given the many vulnerabilities across all vendors over the last years, secure development and operation practices are missing across the board. Cisco managed to fuck up their entire secure boot solution (https://thrangrycat.com/), Intel's ME can be taken out of service despite "firmware signing", and I presume that a proper audit by the government would have uncovered that.

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#18

Post by chrisco255 »

Alupis wrote: post #12
petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

I don't really see the fear mongering or problem here. This executive order would forbid the government from purchasing and installing Telecom/Networking equipment that would be considered to have a higher than acceptable risk. Given that China isn't exactly the most friendly nation to the US, and given Huawei is by nature, an extension of the Chinese Government, it's not unreasonable to assume China might at some po…

Maybe that's our fault for outsourcing all of our semiconductor production to China. We got cheap electronics out of the deal, but we've lost a lot of expertise in manufacturing as a result.

Re: Trump Moves to Ban Foreign Telecom Gear, Targeting Huawei and China

#20

Post by laurentdc »

mey wrote: post #11
petschge wrote: post #4

The fear mongering against Huawei becomes really interesting when you look at all the "sorry, we forgot about that unintentional access possibility" incidents in Cisco gear that might either be back doors or lousy QA leading to security problems.

Watching from afar, the amount of huge holes in Cisco are staggering. I don't really understand IT's love of Cisco, other than that's all they've certed in/invested in/never get fired for IBM mentality. For people in the networking space, what makes you use cisco for firewalls/core routing at this point?

* abundance of people with Cisco knowledge and certifications, everyone has fiddled with a Cisco CLI at some point in their career

* devices on the gray market are very cheap, low barrier to entry for setting up a lab or a SMB infrastructure

* the lower end stuff is pretty much set and forget (e.g. we still have 1700 series devices from year 2003 routing calls without a hiccup)

* "nobody ever got fired for buying Cisco" company mentality

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