Starting back in January of 2018, Huawei began to attract unwanted attention when Huawei's CEO Richard Yu addressed the loss of AT&T support and FBI Director Chris Wray warned against buying Huawei phones. Following this, Huawei's reputation continued to plummet due to various scandals including: reports revealing Huawei was given access to special user data on Facebook, Huawei getting caught cheating on phone benchmark tests, and having a Huawei employee getting arrested in Poland for alleged spying.
The tension between the popular technology company and the United States was at its highest in December of 2018 when at the request of the US, Huawei's CFO was arrested by Canada and was released with a $10 million bail. A constant back and forth continued between the two, Huawei sued
the United States government for its equipment ban, while the United States demanded Germany to drop Huawei or it will limit information sharing. This all eventually led to the effective ban of all Huawei technologies with national security order.
So what does this mean for Canada? After getting involved under the influence of the United States, Canada has been in a very strange place. Being such great allies to both countries, Canada has to decide which side to back. In January of 2019, China warned that there would be repercussions behind the banning of all Huawei products in Canada, although those repercussions were not stated. "This is an important decision for Canada and we will make it based on what is right for our country," Ralph Goodale, minister of Public Safety of Canada said at a cabinet retreat.
I agree with you Timme about the ban of Huawei products in the west. It has been a rough start for Huawei after this ban with national security order. This is a great example of how problems can start from a misunderstanding. If both the United States and China came to an agreement or a discussion, it wouldn't have resulted in the loss of a very good company. According to The National, Huawei is the third most famous company in making smartphones. Huawei has made some questionable decisions over the last year. If these decisions were not made, maybe the company would have been alive today. It is a shame to see it's end very soon.
ReplyDeleteI think it'll be interesting to see Canada's upcoming decision because by either choosing to ban Huawei products or not, they will still strain international relationships. Personally I believe that Canada should ban Huawei products, as it could be a potential security risk and it will keep relationships with the United States good. Though I believe that it would be ideal for the United States and China to come to an agreement which sorts out this situation, though that does seem unlikely with the current political climate in the United States. I do though believe that this banning was justified, as Huawei wasn't exactly making great business moves through selling data and the such.
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