Huawei, Chinese Telecoms Giant, “Assisting” Vladimir Putin in his efforts to restore stability to Russia’s internet network Amid cyberattacks
Huawei, the Chinese telecoms behemoth, has sparked calls for an investigation after reports that the company rushed to Russia’s aid following cyber-attacks on its internet network.
According to reports in China, the IT giant, which has numerous locations in the UK, has been assisting Vladimir Putin in his efforts to stabilize Russia’s internet network after it was targeted by hacker groups all over the world.
Since the invasion of Ukraine, Russian government and media websites have been repeatedly disrupted by suspected cyber attacks by organisations attacking the country.
Last week, a group claiming to be part of the Anonymous hacking network attacked Russian media sites and replaced pages with a ‘tombstone’ in honor of the war dead.
Huawei, which has five research centers in Russia, is alleged to have ‘rushed to Russia’s help’ in the wake of the attacks to support its internet network.
Huawei would use its research centers to teach ‘50,000 technical people in Russia,’ according to a report that emerged on a Chinese news site but was then removed.
It added that the firm expects to expand ‘to cutting-edge fields such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and face recognition’.
‘I am deeply concerned that a company seen by the UK government as such a national security threat that they were unable to allow their equipment to stay in Britain’s new 5G system is still here in the UK,’ said Conservative MP Iain Duncan-Smith, who raised the issue in the House of Commons last Thursday.
‘It is very likely now they have been busy helping this despotic regime in Russia.
‘There should be a full investigation now because if we’re sanctioning oligarchs who have been helping Putin we should be looking at companies that have been helping Putin as well.
‘If Russia thought for one moment China would break rank they wouldn’t have invaded Ukraine.’
If it is discovered that Chinese corporations are assisting Russian companies in evading the measures, the US may impose secondary sanctions.
US sanctions were imposed in 2019 over national security concerns, and Huawei was barred from delivering equipment for the UK’s 5G network.
