They posed an unacceptable risk to national security, the US telecommunications regulator FCC said on Friday. “As a result of our order, no new Huawei or ZTE devices can be approved,” FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr wrote on Twitter. It is also possible to revoke existing permits. It is the “first time in FCC history” that new devices have been banned due to national safety concerns.
The decision comes as no surprise. US President Joe Biden had sealed the exclusion of Huawei and ZTE network technology from the US market by law last year and thus the policy of his Republican predecessor donald trump continued in the economic crime with China. The law had broad bipartisan support at the time. The FCC now had to vote on the corresponding order within a year in order for it to be implemented. The US accuses Huawei of close ties to Chinese authorities and warns of espionage and sabotage. The company denies the allegations.
As president in 2019, during the smoldering trade conflict with China, Trump declared a national emergency in telecommunications and as a result put Huawei and numerous subsidiaries on a blacklist of companies. This meant that US companies were only allowed to do business with the Chinese company with a permit; As a result, Huawei was cut off from important US technology such as microchips. The Chinese Huawei competitor ZTE had previously been restricted.
The US sanctions also meant that Huawei had to do without pre-installed Google services on new smartphones. So were the google play Store for millions of Android apps plus many popular apps like GMail and Google Maps accessible only through a web browser. Other popular apps were completely absent. With the development of a new HarmonyOS operating system, Huawei then tried to contain the damage that the US sanctions had done to the group’s smartphone business in particular.
In addition to Huawei and ZTE, the FCC’s order also affects devices from Hytera Communications as well as Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology and Dahua Technology. “Even new devices from Dahua, Hikvision, or Hytera cannot be approved unless they assure the FCC that their devices will not be used for public safety, government security, or other national security purposes,” Carr wrote on twitter. Huawei and ZTE are already heavily affected by US sanctions.
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