A cybersecurity expert has warned that delaying the 5G rollout because of concerns about Chinese vendors could pose a greater risk to the UK than allowing limited use of their equipment.
Emily Taylor, CEO of Oxford Information Labs, told a parliamentary sub-committee reviewing the security of the UK’s 5G network that extended delays driven by a bid to remove every piece of Chinese equipment would carry significant economic and social consequences.
“The risk to the country is, if we decide we are so unhappy with the idea of a high risk vendor being in our infrastructure – despite the fact that vendor has been in our infrastructure for the past 15 years – we are going to delay our 5G until we have got every bit of Chinese equipment out of the country. That will bring economic and social risks.”
Much of the debate centers on Huawei, China’s largest telecommunications vendor. Concerns have been raised by some governments that Huawei could be influenced by Beijing, and the company has been the subject of international pressure and campaigns aimed at limiting its role in Western networks.
“Huawei is a lightning rod for justifiable concerns about how comfortable we feel about a technical world order where China is the superpower and not the US… We are going to have to face up to that.”
After a multi-year security assessment, the UK government announced in January that it would permit the use of Huawei equipment under strict restrictions. Those conditions are designed to limit potential national security risks while allowing network upgrades to proceed.
Key limitations include a ban on Huawei equipment in the core of telecom networks and a cap that prevents more than 35 percent of the Radio Access Network (RAN) from being supplied by the vendor. In addition, Huawei gear is prohibited from being installed near sensitive locations such as military bases, nuclear facilities, and other critical sites.
Earlier this month, BT — one of the UK’s largest telecom operators — said it would replace Huawei equipment in its 4G and 5G core networks with products from Ericsson. The government has set a deadline of January 2023 for providers to remove Huawei from their core networks.
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