NEW DELHI: Former chief of the US Central Intelligence Agency ( CIA) Michael Hayden's remarks that China's telecom giant Huawei "is a significant security threat" and has spied for the Chinese government has raised fresh concern here over the firm.
The world's No. 2 telecom equipment manufacturer is a significant player in the Indian telecom market with Tata Teleservices and Reliance Infocomm having tie-ups with the company for import of telecom gear. The revelations are significant given India's telecom dependence on China and the US, with the latter hitting headlines recently for tapping internet and phone traffic in other countries. Hayden made the allegations in an interview to Australian Financial Review newspaper on Friday. He told the paper that Huawei has "shared with the Chinese state intimate and extensive knowledge of the foreign telecommunications systems it is involved with" .
The unease has increased with Britain also launching a thorough investigation to check whether Chinese telecom company Huawei was used by Beijing to spy on the United Kingdom. The parliamentary intelligence and security committee (ISC) raised concerns recently that Huawei's equipment were used by Britain's top secret cyber-security evaluation centre — known as the Cell in Banbury, Oxfordshire.
According to the newspaper , Hayden said intelligence agencies have hard evidence of spying activity by the company but did not elaborate on the quality of the evidence.
Huawei rejected the allegations made by Hayden with its global cyber security officer John Suffolk describing Hayden's comments as "tired, unsubstantiated defamatory remarks" and challenged him and other critics to present evidence publicly, the newspaper reported.
Huawei, founded in 1987 by former People's Liberation Army (PLA) officer Ren Zhengfei, has repeatedly denied being linked to the Chinese government or military or receiving financial support from either.
However, this is not the first time such concerns have been raised about the company . While the US has raised it repeatedly with House of Representatives' intelligence committee last October urging American firms to stop doing business with Huawei because of spying concerns, India too has come closer to snapping ties with the company several times.
In 2009-10 India stopped state-owned telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. from procuring gear from Huawei, citing worries that they could be embedded with spy gear. However, the government later eased up allowing companies to deal with Huawei on the condition that a laboratory had to first certify the equipment as spyware-free . In 2001, concerns were raised about connections Huawei Technologies India with the Taliban but no evidence was found of it.
A senior Research and Analysis Wing officer said, "Huawei has always been a suspect company in terms of its gadgets being embedded with spyware. Such concerns have been raised earlier too. But commercial considerations have outweighed security concerns. Huawei provides the cheapest telecom gear in the world."
The Australian government has barred Huawei from involvement in the building of its A$37.4 billion national broadband network. Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/Huawei-a-threat-it-spies-for-China-Ex-CIA-chief/articleshow/21206193.cms
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