US Telecoms Are Going To Start Physically Removing Huawei Gear (bloomberg.com) 59
All over the country, hardware from Huawei and ZTE keeps American telecom networks humming. In the coming months, many of those networks are going to start ripping it all out. From a report: On Friday, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission officially kicked off the reimbursement program for replacing equipment from the two Chinese companies, both of which have been deemed a threat to national security. That means that telecoms can apply for subsidies to purge the hardware from their networks. A lot has been made of the geopolitical connotations of the technology blacklist, which includes Huawei and ZTE, but the physical logistics of overhauling the nation's connectivity infrastructure is just as complicated given how much banned equipment is currently in the wild.
The process that started last week allows telecoms to file expenses for wiping out the hardware. Whenever those funds are approved and sent, "the clock starts ticking," says John Nettles, president of Alabama-based Pine Belt Communications Inc. "You're expected to complete it within one year after receiving your first reimbursement." For the target recipients of the program, small and usually rural carriers with no more than 10 million customers, that means 2022 is going to be an insanely busy year. Without expansive subsidies, these telecoms have said they would not have been able to afford to comply with the government mandate, but now with federal reimbursements, they'll soon be under the gun to source enough labor and eligible replacement gear to meet the FCC's deadline. Nettles estimates it'll likely take a four-person crew a week to overhaul each of his 67 towers.
The process that started last week allows telecoms to file expenses for wiping out the hardware. Whenever those funds are approved and sent, "the clock starts ticking," says John Nettles, president of Alabama-based Pine Belt Communications Inc. "You're expected to complete it within one year after receiving your first reimbursement." For the target recipients of the program, small and usually rural carriers with no more than 10 million customers, that means 2022 is going to be an insanely busy year. Without expansive subsidies, these telecoms have said they would not have been able to afford to comply with the government mandate, but now with federal reimbursements, they'll soon be under the gun to source enough labor and eligible replacement gear to meet the FCC's deadline. Nettles estimates it'll likely take a four-person crew a week to overhaul each of his 67 towers.
What happens to the removed hardware? (Score:2)
If it's cheap enough I could see wanting one of these just to play with. Cheap enough being under $100.
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If they're being pulled for security reasons you can bet they're going straight to scrap. If they really believe there's some kind of backdoor or data leak they wouldn't want them being on the used market either.
Probably a few going to three-letter agencies for analysis too.
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Sell to third-world countries. I'm sure they could appreciate cheap hardware with an open back door.
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Sell it to countries where the US doesn't care one way or the other what China might do to those countries as far as spying goes.
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It's funny .... (Score:2)
You would figure this would be a hot topic... so far it looks like I'm first.
But then again who wants to be recorded in either US or Chinese intelligence data?
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It's a hard topic to say something rational about. Surely it is because of politics, but is it a good idea? A bad idea? How do you decide?
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Usually it's better to get recorded by foreign country than your own government. Your own government can legally kill you after all and is usually closer.
Re: It's funny .... (Score:2)
I'm not so much worried about the Chinese government as I am my own.
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Depends on the scope of your worry. If it's entirely personal then China knowing what sort of porn you like or what shows you watch is irrelevant compared to your own government knowing details they might find repugnant. If it's something rational like your national economy and China has access to things like trade secrets that can have a potentially devastating effect on your economy then the question skews the other way.
My short time in China taught me that intellectual property theft is a way of life the
This level of expense suggests secret proof (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't like to make arguments from secret intelligence, but the willingness to spend so much money to remove Huawei gear suggests that they do have some secret proof that Huawei gear represents a unique threat (rather than just leaving in likely accidental backdoors like other telecoms equipment manufacturers). It doesn't really make sense to pay people to rip out old gear if the Huawei ban is simply part of a proxy trade war with China. Security researchers should see this as a good reason to start testing the hell out of this equipment to find out what the threat is and reveal it to the public.
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Does it really though? After all, it's not the government's money... they can just raise taxes and make us all pay for it. When's the last time you saw a truly budget-conscious federal policy?
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Well do like we did with the wall. Bill another country for it.
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Re: This level of expense suggests secret proof (Score:3)
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British Intelligence says Huawei poses long term risk. [reuters.com] Unless it is opposite day.
From the article you posted “NCSC does not believe that the defects identified are a result of Chinese state interference.”
NCSC basically said there are code issues - at the same level as other commercial vendors - and they don't see any state level interference. And then offered the opinion that it is a risk. As opposed to Cisco, where...
Snowden: The NSA planted backdoors in Cisco products [infoworld.com]
Backdoors Keep Appearing In Cisco's Routers [tomshardware.com]
Cisco removed its seventh backdoor account this year, [zdnet.com]
Re:This level of expense suggests secret proof (Score:5, Interesting)
That or the NSA has a backdoor in the replacement equipment.
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Or rather people are so afraid of being called out as "chinese lovers" so instead people play the game of "I shout the loudest", and in the end if any one would have said "let's calm down and think this through" and it later would turn out to actually be a back door then those people would have been crucified, if it later turns out that there was not a single back door in any of the discarded electronics then there is no one left to blame since every one was in on the train and it will just be seen as a was
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My take always was Huawei wouldn't install any backdoors. Hence their CFO being arrested in 2018. The CEO of Qwest has similar claims https://www.denverpost.com/201... [denverpost.com]
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No, it does not. It suggests somebody will earn a lot of money from this. Probably the replacement will be known-to-be-backdoored (by really bad coding) Cisco crap.
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Honestly the backdoor idea is just a distraction. Almost all data being transmitted nowadays are encrypted, so there's not much point getting that data. Plus with VPNs you can't even identify the source and destination of the packets.
Meanwhile Cisco stock has outperformed the S&P 500 by 16% since the beginning of the year.
well wohoo.. (Score:2, Troll)
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Not so nice when someone else is peaking over your shoulder is it US? :D
Oh? And please tell us which government isn't peaking?
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I peaked last night about 11pm...
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I peaked last night about 11pm...
Just keep your O face to yourself :D
Popcorn Time (Score:2)
Gonna sit back and watch as the ACs and brand new accounts weigh in.
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Ain't that the truth.
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In the end, the new equipment will likely be compromised by other means anyway. But hey, shovel ready jobs, right?
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You ought be on Fox.
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Re: OK China bad (Score:2)
That network will keep all the badfeels (opposing viewpoints) from reaching sensitive MAGA eyes.
Really, did it require a whole new antisocial media service to continue the huge circle jerk and preaching to the preachers MAGA bruhaha?
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There's nothing sinophobic about it. The US was prohibited from performing this type of research, so they paid a Chinese lab to do it via a third part organization.
I have no vested interest in where it came from, but the most plausible explanation is that it came from that lab. The lab was specifically collecting bat coronavirus samples from caves around China. It was, in fact, SPECIFICALLY targeting this kind of virus. Even the most anti-trump mainstream media has reported this (although in some cases
we're starting to see 6-month delays for equipment (Score:3)
and that's going to swell as all the smaller operations hit the order books.. cue the requests for extending deadlines....
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On the plus side there will be loads of cheap used Huawei gear on eBay.
Hoping some of it can have the OS replaced with pfSense or something. The only issue is that this carrier grade stuff trends to be loud. The fans run constantly at full speed. Can probably mod it.
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Oh no, there won't be.
This gear's going to be tracked and traced. The nice men in the 3-piece suits are going to be loading them into the Flowers By Irene van parked out front, and it'll never be seen again.
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And why should they do that? Because otherwise people could analyze it and find that all the claims of backdoors were lies?
I'd love a good forensic analysis (Score:3)
It can't be very difficult for some company to do a deep forensic analysis of the hardware to find out what it's really doing and make the methods and results public so anyone can verify them.
Re:I'd love a good forensic analysis (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe Cyber Ninjas is available.
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Well people HAVE been clamoring for open-hardware, so here's an opportunity to get those open-designs built.
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Sifive boards are being built but not in any quantity. https://www.mouser.com/Product... [mouser.com]
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Ofcourse.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Ofcourse.. (Score:1)
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