Germany does not want to prevent the participation of the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei in the construction of a 5G mobile network. "I do not see at the moment that there can be a lump-sum commitment or rejection to certain providers," said the spokesman for the Federal Ministry of the Interior (BMI), Steve Alter, on Monday in the Federal Press Conference.
Alter responded to a report of the "Handelsblatt" on Monday. The business paper had reported that the federal government renounced at the insistence of the Federal Chancellery on a ban on Chinese technology in the construction of the new 5G networks.
Government spokesman Steffen Seibert stated on demand: "I do not confirm that such an alleged prohibition clause has given to our knowledge in any of the draft versions and therefore there has been no such intervention by the Federal Chancellery."
The government excludes "no actor, no company from scratch," Seibert continued. But set up a "catalog of extended stringent safety requirements" for components used in 5G network expansion.
No lump-sum cancellations
The goal of these requirements was to prevent spying on the new networks, said Steve Alter. "The approach is one in which criteria catalogs created by subject matter experts must be met, and then it can be decided as part of the certification process which provider is eligible for certain components," continues the BMI spokesman.
There could not be a blanket commitment or rejection to certain providers because the concept takes into account different components in completely different infrastructure environments. Therefore, it could happen that "one component is allowed by one provider in one infrastructure area and not another, perhaps a core component in a critical area."
Basically, the government has never changed its position, according to Alter - "We said from the beginning that we did not choose a vendor-specific approach". Instead, the security requirements developed in cooperation with the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) should be such that they are applicable to all providers. The presentation of the new security requirements will take place soon, it is apparently planned for Friday of this week.
Cancellation to the USA
The German Press Agency, which has received a draft of these security requirements of the Federal Network Agency, writes that a crucial point has been weakened compared to a key points version of the paper, which was presented in March: it no longer means that suppliers are trustworthy have to be. Rather, they only have to assure their trustworthiness and make a statement.
If the security requirements were to be decided in this form, Germany would largely ignore US warnings. Concerned about espionage, Washington warns that Huawei will be excluded from setting up cellular networks. Huawei always rejects the allegations of espionage by the US, so far the US has not produced any evidence to substantiate its allegations.
