Background: US-Huawei conflict - timeline and reasons

_{Source: The Hacker News}

What happened?

US President Donald Trump, by his decree banning the use of equipment that poses a threat to US national security , put the Chinese company Huawei in a difficult situation. She lost the opportunity to work with Android OS, proprietary Google services and contacts with an American corporation. Moreover, the right to use Android Huawei lost around the world, not just the United States.

On May 15 this year, the US Department of Commerce listed Huawei on the Entity List, barring it from purchasing electronic components and parts from US companies without the approval of the US government. May 21, the restriction was temporarily lifted, for the sake of “minimizing customer disruptions,” but from August 19 it will be operational on an ongoing basis. The reason for the conflict between the United States and Huawei is the trade war between the PRC and America. But the decision itself did not appear suddenly; it matured for several years.

How did it all start?

In January 2003, Cisco accused Huawei of infringing its patents and illegally copying the Cisco IOS operating system and command line interface. The lawsuit stated that Huawei had copied source codes, Cisco documentation, and other copyrighted material. The American company demanded not only to stop using its intellectual property, but also to compensate for the damage resulting from illegal actions.

In June of that year, a US court found Cisco to be the affected party . And at the same time, the judge refused to completely ban the use of Huawei software for network equipment. The court also did not prohibit Huawei from using the command line interface.

In 2004, a new conflict arose. It became known about a letter from Fujitsu Network Communications CEO to Huawei CEO. It spoke of an employee of a Chinese company, Yi Bin Zhu, who carefully studied the electronic components of a device released by Fujitsu for telecom operators. This would not be unusual if an employee did not disassemble this device directly at a trade show where the Fujitsu system was shown to visitors. Caught confessed to photographing components. The spy’s badge indicated that he worked for Weihua, but a business card appeared in his pocket, indicating that the person was a Huawei employee. Representatives of the latter said they did not know anything about this person, nor about his intentions.

In 2008, the US governmentaccused Chinese companies Huawei and ZTE of being a threat to America’s security.


_{Representatives of the US government announce an information threat from Chinese telecommunications companies.}

It was reported that the equipment of these companies is used by the US military, government organizations, research institutions and corporations, and it "leaks" information over the Network to China. Therefore, the military and US officials were forbidden to buy equipment from China, and Huawei and ZTE lost the opportunity to acquire American startups.

At that time, Huawei was not yet one of the largest manufacturers of smartphones and electronic devices. This company was known only as a supplier of specialized equipment for telecom operators. Having lost the opportunity to act in the United States, the Chinese shifted to other markets.

But did Huawei smartphones sell in the US?

It's like that. After a couple of years, the company began to supply mobile devices to the world market. Things were so successful that in 2015 Google even ordered them to create a Nexus 6P smartphone. The phone appeared in American retail, but the operators did not sell it, and without their support, there was no noticeable growth. After a couple of years, Huawei planned to sell the Mate 10 Pro smartphone in the United States, but it did not work again - as far as you can understand, the US government influenced the refusal of operators to cooperate with the Chinese company.

Despite the difficulties, in 2018, sales of Huawei mobile devices grew to 200 million units.

At what point did Huawei begin to have serious problems?

In March 2018, the largest US retailer Best Buy stopped cooperation with the Chinese. A few weeks later, the Pentagon banned the military from buying Huawei and ZTE phones . Congress “asked” Google to stop working with Huawei.

Accusations from the United States in the theft of information of national importance led to the fact that other countries began to be wary of Huawei. Telecommunications operators in Australia , Japan and the UK stopped working with her .

At the end of 2018, Huawei Finance Director Meng Wangzhou was arrested. From Canada, she had to go to the USA for, in fact, interrogation. It turned out that Huawei was accused of violating the embargo on the supply of telecommunications equipment to Iran.

And now what?

The US may also cancel the presidential decree after the conflict with China subsides. But when this will happen and whether it will happen at all is unclear.

Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei said the company is ready for US restrictions . Blacklisting will not greatly affect the work of the Chinese corporation. Ren said that the pace of development of the company may slow down, but "things will not reach a negative level."

But what about Huawei further without Android?

Representatives of the company have already stated that they are ready for prohibited measures by the United States. In the fall, Huawei will introduce its own operating system. The executive director for the consumer sector, Yu Chengdong (also known as Richard Yu), said that the in-house operating system "will allow us to integrate smartphones, computers, tablets, televisions, cars, smart wearable devices and other devices into a single whole." “Huawei will combine everything you need from Android and the Internet,” said Yu.

Will there be updates for already released Huawei models for Android?

If the firmware of already released models ceases to be updated, then the phones will still remain operational. Installed applications will continue to work and are likely to receive updates.

In extreme cases, you can install alternative firmware, for example, LineageOS. It is designed for Huawei smartphone models such as Honor View 10, Honor 4 / 4X, Honor 5X and Huawei P20 Pro.

What to do if the app store for Huawei smartphones is turned off?

If Google Play is disabled for phones already released, applications can be downloaded from alternative directories or directly using * .APK files. This is inconvenient, but if there is no other way out, then this is the only way.