By Joseph Marks
November 1 at 7:12 AM

U.S. government officials used to balk at the mere idea that allied nations might allow the Chinese telecom company Huawei to build parts of their next-generation 5G wireless networks, saying it would pose an unacceptable risk of Chinese spying.

Now they’re game planning a future where that seems nearly inevitable.

The long-range plan, which officials outlined yesterday during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing, is basically to increase U.S. innovation around the “edge” portion of super-fast 5G networks — where Huawei has made the greatest inroads with European telecom companies — and to make those components more reliant on U.S. software than on Huawei’s hardware.

If such a move is successful, it should make it easier for nations that allow Huawei to build edge components — basically the link between devices and cell towers known as radio access networks, or RANs — to shift to a model where Huawei is less involved. It would also shift the playing field from 5G hardware, where U.S. companies aren't playing a significant role, to software, where those companies are world leaders.

“This is a blip. This is just a temporal anomaly almost,” the Department of Homeland Security’s top cybersecurity official Chris Krebs told senators. “If we can unlock the open radio access network piece, the vendor base in the United States, the innovation base is going to explode.”

An open radio access network, or O-RAN, is basically a software-based version of the more hardware-focused RAN, which is more compatible with components from other vendors.

The government should consider funding some basic O-RAN research to make it more lucrative for U.S. tech companies to move into the space, Krebs told panel Chai Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), saying "the private sector is going to surge into the market if we can make it compelling."

Federal Communications Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel suggested using FCC-sponsored 5G “innovation zones” in New York City and Salt Lake City as testing grounds for the components.

“We need an approach to supply chain security that recognizes that, despite our best efforts, secure networks in the United States will only get us so far,” Rosenworcel told lawmakers. “We need to start researching how we can build networks that can withstand connection to equipment [with] vulnerabilities around the world.”

That frank talk is a sea change from just six months ago when officials first began to publicly contemplate a future in which Huawei isn't barred from 5G by allies with whom the United States shares vital intelligence.

Huawei has steadfastly maintained it has never aided Chinese spying and would refuse to do so if asked. Spying concerns are supercharged, though, because 5G will carry orders of magnitude more data than existing wireless networks and power a new generation of connected devices such as autonomous vehicles and automated factories.

U.S. officials also say Huawei is getting an outsize portion of the 5G market because Beijing’s subsidies help it undersell competitors such as Samsung and Nokia.

To be sure, U.S. officials haven’t given up on swaying European leaders. And they’ve had some success convincing them to restrict Huawei from “core” parts of 5G where it would have far more access to sensitive data.

Some European nations are also discussing restricting Huawei from edge portions of 5G in particularly sensitive geographic areas, such as around government buildings, Jim Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who works closely with international cybersecurity leaders, told me.

But most U.S. allies continue to push back on pleas to fully bar the company.

During the past few weeks, leaders in England and Germany inched ever closer to Huawei building portions of their 5G networks. And Huawei is already inking 5G contracts with telecom firms in England, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and Sweden — and hoping a good reputation in Europe will batter back U.S. claims that the company is untrustworthy.

“We’ll know in six months how it’s going to work out, and the money is on the Chinese side because Huawei is subsidized,” Lewis told me. “[European] security ministries are against Huawei and economic ministries are for it, and the political people are torn.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/the-cybersecurity-202/2019/11/01/the-cybersecurity-202-u-s-officials-are-working-on-a-huawei-long-game/5dbb124388e0fa5ad928dc0e/