The Pentagon bans Huawei and ZTE phones from retail stores on military bases

Photo by David Becker/Getty Images

The Pentagon is ordering retail outlets on US military bases to stop selling Huawei and ZTE phones. The Department of Defense says using the devices could be a security risk.

“Huawei and ZTE devices may pose an unacceptable risk to the department’s personnel, information and mission,” a Pentagon spokesperson said in a statement to The Wall Street Journal. “In light of this information, it was not prudent for the department’s exchanges to continue selling them.”

US military members can still buy Huawei and ZTE devices for personal use from other stores, as there’s no outright ban on that for now. But the spokesperson elaborated that the Pentagon is considering whether it should send out a military-wide advisory about the devices.

Huawei responded to the news in a statement to The Verge: “Huawei’s products are sold in 170 countries worldwide and meet the highest standards of security, privacy and engineering in every country we operate globally including the US. We remain committed to openness and transparency in everything we do and want to be clear that no government has ever asked us compromise the security or integrity of any of our networks or devices.” The Chinese smartphone maker said it was an “employee-owned company” that would continue to expand globally.

US government officials have said that China could order its manufacturers to create backdoors for spying in their devices, although both Huawei and ZTE have denied the possibility. An anonymous source told the WSJ that military leaders are wary that Beijing could use ZTE and Huawei devices to locate soldiers’ exact coordinates and track their movements.

The US government has been making more significant moves against Chinese tech companies since December, although officials have been suspicious of the two companies since before then (such as in 2014 when Huawei was banned from bidding for US government contracts). In a Senate testimony this past February, six major US intelligence heads warned that American citizens shouldn’t use Huawei and ZTE products and services. In January, US lawmakers introduced a bill that would ban US government agencies from using the two companies’ phones and equipment.

For a separate reason, the US Department of Commerce banned US exports to ZTE last month after the company failed to meet a plea agreement when it pleaded guilty to illegally shipping US equipment to North Korea and Iran. ZTE is appealing the ban. Anonymous sources told the WSJ last week that the Justice Department is now probing Huawei for possibly violating sanctions against Iran.

We’ve reached out to the Department of Defense and ZTE for further comment.

Update May 2nd 1:40PM ET: This article has been updated with a statement from Huawei.

Comments

Good, I like my spyware home grown in the good ol’ U S of A!

psffft! They will still BYOD their ZTE phones to work and say it’s secured by BlackBerry BES (like they are doing now)

They ***may*** cause a security risk

Really? That’s all it takes to ban phones from a foreign company? Either they have real reasons, and they just have to publish their finding to demolish the company’s reputation worldwide. Or they just want to mess with China, and they are going to lose at this game.

The real reasons have already been exasperated in numerous articles throughout the internet. Do some research.

As in, to this day, the govt has provided zero proof of Huawei spying and been wanting to undermine China’s soft power in the smartphone market, as part of the China-US trade war that’s going on? If Apple suddenly got banned in China due to "security" reasons I doubt the reaction would be this passive from the international community.

The US isn’t the only nation banning them. Actually do some research on why ZTE & Huawei are being banned. You’re making things far too surface. Apple doesn’t have the direct ties to corrupt entities and surveillance that ZTE/Huawei do. So yeah Apple being banned would be "less passive." Also Apple is a far larger and vastly more popular company.

I had BX/PX privileges as a kid. The store is not a democracy or a free market. This is a dick move, but not unexpected. Many of the people who shop there are retirees and dependents of active duty military.

Every Chinese Company serves at the pleasure of the Red Chinese Gov’t. We went through this with the back doors built into all the Chinese routers several years back. They just got caught doing it……

The USA government really wants to see Apple products getting banned in China as well.

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