Key points in this article:

• Sen. Marco Rubio requests Canada to also prohibit Huawei use
• Using Huawei for communication infrastructure means risking cyber attacks
• China plans to watch over the world through its 5G network and surveillance cameras

 
U.S. Senators Marco Rubio and Mark Warner sent a message to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau asking his government to ban Chinese telecommunications company Huawei from Canada’s 5G network, the South China Morning Post has reported.

Canada is a member of the Five Eyes (FVEY) alliance, an intelligence sharing arrangement between the 5 Anglosphere countries (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K. and the U.S.).

If Canada succumbs to the temptations of using 5G services provided by Chinese companies linked to the Beijing government – such as Huawei – they will be endangering the entire intelligence network. If the network is used for military purposes and China taps into it, all military strategies will be leaked out, jeopardizing safety on an international level.

The U.S. National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which was signed by President Trump in August, placed a ban on government use of Huawei and ZTE services. Huawei devices have a backdoor that China uses to steal personal information.

Trump’s security team said in January that the U.S. government is considering building its own 5G network within 3 years. It will expand on work done by American telecommunications companies such as AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile.

Fears of Cyber Attacks on Infrastructure

The Japanese government should also safeguard the country’s communication infrastructure by putting a ban on Huawei and ZTE services, but such action has been forestalled.

The U.S., on the other hand, has been making steady progress initiated by Congress. When 3Com was almost purchased by Huawei back in 2008, only to be prevented by CFIUS just in the nick of time, members of Congress began advocating for thorough investigations into China’s moves to obtain classified technology. In 2012, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence published a detailed report on those investigations.

Considering that 60% of Huawei’s profits come from overseas, it was not surprising that it began to protest when the new NDAA bill was announced. If Huawei is wiped out of the American market it will limit its price competition, which will lead to a drop in consumers and a reduction in business innovation.

Installing Huawei’s “cheap” products in a country’s electricity supply network means risking cyber attacks on electricity, gas, financial institutions, waterworks and railways. Also, China could easily control a “blackout panic” like the one that happened in Hokkaido during the September earthquake.

The new changes to the U.S. NDAA have shifted the approach to inspecting foreign investments from a business standpoint to a security standpoint: investments are now heavily restricted on important infrastructure.

In December 2017, before the new NDAA was enacted, the U.S. Senate and House intelligence committees sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to pressure AT&T to drop its deal to launch Huawei products, Reuters reported. It is an example of the government compelling private businesses to comply with national safety standards.

Investors Flock to the Surveillance Camera Industry

The new 5G communications network also has its dangers. If it is linked to surveillance technology like facial recognition, it will be used to reinforce a surveillance society. China plans to install 626 million surveillance cameras around the country by 2020.

HIKVISION and Dahua Technology are both Chinese companies and they jointly hold over 40% of the market share in the industry globally.

HIKVISION has long been selling Chinese security authorities a product that uses technology to supposedly distinguish people belonging to an ethnic minority. They received an order to install 30,000 surveillance cameras in the city of Urumqi in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and are known to have made a 30% increase in sales this year.

China’s government-owned munitions company CETC holds 40% of HIKVISION’s stocks, so clearly HIKVISION is closely affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party. In a report issued in April, U.S. management consultant Interos Solutions names Huawei and Lenovo as companies that we should be wary of.

The world of finance, however, does not care about the ethical risks posed by China’s technology companies. Investors have decided that it is an opportune time to “buy” this new technology, and are effectively and indirectly contributing to China’s human rights oppressions. Knowingly or unknowingly, private investors around the world have a hand in China’s discriminatory atrocities.

Looking to Japan, Softbank has collaborated with Huawei and has therefore contributed to the expansion of China’s 5G empire. If Huawei succeeds in developing the next generation network, Japan would have effectively helped them complete their surveillance society and the persecution of minorities such as the Uyghurs.

The 5G Global Surveillance Society

But that is not all. China is trying to construct a smart city domestically, and export that network along the One Belt One Road economic region, such as in South-East Asia. In other words, China’s 5G strategy is to import its surveillance society model to the world.

This is a neo-Comintern. Lenin launched the Communist International in 1919 to spread communism throughout the world and to initiate a simultaneous world revolution. A modern-day version of this can be realized through a 5G network, surveillance cameras and AI technology.

In Australia, where China’s espionage is most active, the government blocked Huawei from the Australian 5G network. This was a surprising move considering over 50% of its 4G service uses Huawei devices.

Japan Needs a Strategy to Compete With China’s 5G Empire

Britain, Australia and even Russia are moving towards restricting Chinese services.

Reuters reported in October that since the beginning of the year, the Five Eyes intelligence alliance is sharing intelligence with Japan and Germany to counter China’s foreign investments and espionage.

From early on the Anglosphere countries had realized the need to establish a counter-China network, and now they want Japan and Germany to join them.

But Japan does not have an anti-espionage law, and their state secrecy measures are insufficient. Legislating an anti-espionage law is a high priority. Japan should also ban Chinese surveillance cameras and 5G services to protect its people against cyber attacks.

As mentioned above, when AT&T received a warning from the FCC, they immediately stepped down from their Huawei deal. Japan must likewise consider compelling private businesses to comply with national safety standards.

Japan plans to launch post-5G research from next year. What it must now do is cooperate with other countries to prepare for a face-off against China in the world of 6G.