FCC Bans Imports of New Foreign-Made Routers, Citing Security Concerns (reuters.com)
- Reference: 0181091894
- News link: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/26/03/24/0435224/fcc-bans-imports-of-new-foreign-made-routers-citing-security-concerns
- Source link: https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/fcc-banning-imports-new-chinese-made-routers-citing-security-concerns-2026-03-23/
> The U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Monday it was [2]banning the import of all new foreign-made consumer routers , the latest crackdown on Chinese-made electronic gear over security concerns. China is estimated to control at least 60% of the U.S. market for home routers, boxes that connect computers, phones, and smart devices to the internet. The FCC order does not impact the import or use of existing models, but will ban new ones.
>
> The agency said a White House-convened review deemed imported routers pose "a severe cybersecurity risk that could be leveraged to immediately and severely disrupt U.S. critical infrastructure." It said malicious actors had exploited security gaps in foreign-made routers "to attack households, disrupt networks, enable espionage, and facilitate intellectual property theft," citing their role in major hacks like Volt and Salt Typhoon. The determination includes an exemption for routers the Pentagon deems do not pose unacceptable risks.
[1] https://slashdot.org/~the_skywise
[2] https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/fcc-banning-imports-new-chinese-made-routers-citing-security-concerns-2026-03-23/
Which ones aren't made in China? (Score:2)
I'd certainly prefer to buy all of my equipment from somewhere other than China, but I'm not sure there are any routers that aren't made there. Anyone know any brands that are made outside of China?
And does this include American brands assembled in China, or that use Chinese parts?
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I believe Ubiquiti Unifi gear is made in Vietnam.
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That's a nice plastic box you've got there.
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It still could be made in china, but passed thru Vietnam to escape tariff.
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When China wants to bypass tariffs, they route their products through client states like Laos and Cambodia. But Vietnam is still a frenemy of China, and is one of the alternatives that companies have been looking at, aside from Singapore and Thailand
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Only problem w/ Unifi is that they do a piss poor job supporting IPv6, which is something like close to 50% of traffic
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I have a Protectli vault with OPNSense on it.
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Where is it made?
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> Anyone know any brands that are made outside of China?
Turris Omnia. Probably does use chinese parts.
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They all use Chinese parts. Worse than that, they all use Chinese developed algorithms too. Key parts of the WiFi and 5G specs are Chinese. If you are really paranoid, you might suspect that they did something like the NSA did back in the day, by deliberately introducing weaknesses into those standards so that they can be hacked by people who know the secret.
Or just be sensible, use defence in depth, as much open source software as you can, and look longingly at the lower prices Europeans pay for hardware.
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The joke is on you, the Cisco routers are also mostly made in China so they likely have backdoors for both countries!
With the exception of the proprietary routers that come with a Starlink dish, I can't think of a single major router manufacturer with a US manufacturing presence.
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I thought the joke was him referring to "the feds". This is the Trump administration, it's not about backdoors, it's about bribes and identity politics.
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Cisco makes their routers in China and have a huge amount of chinese developers as well - it's not just the hardware.
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Cisco gear. Chinese backdoors installed at the factory, NSA backdoors installed when they ship it to you.
I'll take my chances with TP-Link. Actually, I really like GL.iNet hardware at the moment. Very solid, and runs a version of OpenWRT. You can flash standard OpenWRT onto most of it too.
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Currently modded flamebait, a sure sign someone with mod points knows it's true.
[1]https://www.tomshardware.com/n... [tomshardware.com]
[1] https://www.tomshardware.com/news/cisco-backdoor-hardcoded-accounts-software,37480.html
If it does not ban existing models... (Score:2)
does that mean they'll continue to manufacture the same old models for the US market, which will possibly become less secure over time due to advanced hacking techniques applied to the same old well known hardware? Will it then result in a net loss in security over time?
It might resemble Cuba with their 1950s automobiles, frozen in time. I do agree that there is concern about backdoors and surreptitious identifying data sent to servers under control of China. Would it be better to allow new models, but
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I'd say a better solution would be to require imported routers support open distros (OpenWRT).
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Comment to undo fat fingered mod
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What's a better solution, if any?
Open source firmware
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The paranoia runs to China installing secret, microscopic chips in everything that mean anything ever made there is compromised.
Business opportunity! (Score:2)
Honestly consumer routers are a huge security risk because most people do not know how to configure, or maintain, them. Think that this policy change represents a big business opportunity for someone to create an iPhone of routers. Current versions still feel very Windows Mobile.
Anyone want to join me starting a company? Send a DM.
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Mesh stuff like Google WiFi shoots for that sort of thing, it is pretty opaque to the user, with Apple style lack of configurability on nitty gritty stuff.
The trum administration: (Score:1)
Continually proving it's just a bunch of unserious unqualified fools.
Tech Decision Made by Non-Techies - SMH (Score:1)
A better restriction would be to require imported routers to support open distros (OpenWRT, etc).
Security concerns my butthole (Score:2)
The fact that they reference a bunch of past breaches and supply chain attacks - but give absolutely zero explanation about how said attacks would be prevented by US manufacturers, nor any explanation of additional cybersecurity controls they will mandate on them - tells you everything you need to know about this.
This is about protectionism, not cybersecurity.
If it had to do with cybersecurity, then a set of objective evaluation criteria could be applied to ANY router, regardless of origin.
Thank You! (Score:2)
Thank you, U.S. government, for liberating me from the tyranny of choice!
It will be interesting to see (Score:1)
It will be interesting to see if there are ANY routers that can "pass". Seems to be before enacting rules like this they "should" be working with partners in the US to make sure the need can be met though. I do believe that a LOT of our supply chains need a lot better resilience, which fly's 100% in the face of the "profit motive". Unregulated capitalism tends to centralize everything, control the market, and then jack up the prices. We'll probably be better off in the long run with a few more pr
Let's think this through (because they didn't) (Score:2)
1. This will almost certainly be challenged in court, and that will take a while.
2. Some amount of gear is about to undergo a US-washing in order to evade this: "Yeah, it was designed in China and built in Vietnam, but final assembly was done in Lubbock, soooooo....it's US-made".
3. If the challenge in (1) is unsuccessful, the price of a US-made router will double. That's what happens competition is removed from markets.
4. Also, the US vendors will do their best to kill open-source firmware/softwar
Please tell me (Score:2)
Mikrotik isn't on the list
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Last I checked, Latvia is a foreign country!
There aren't any NOT foreign-made routers (Score:2)
We're a little early for April 1, but to me, I just read "When your router dies, no more Internet for you." When I read more about this, it only applies to future products that haven't been approved yet, but that's only a reprieve of a couple of years before some forced redesign obsoletes the current products.
The current reality is that ~100% of all network routers currently manufactured (consumer-grade or otherwise) are made overseas. Except one. Starlink.
Donald Trump's FCC and Trump's national securit
Why now? (Score:2)
Even if they did start to ban new routers, bad actors still have all the old ones they can exploit. Is it coming down to making sure people play by the rules of router security (like not having a default password).
Not just Routers (Score:2)
Unfortunately, their definition of "Router" is so amazingly broad as to be useless
> For the purpose of this determination, the term “Routers” is defined by National Institute of Science and Technology’s Internal Report 8425A to include consumer-grade networking devices that are primarily intended for residential use and can be installed by the customer. Routers forward data packets, most commonly Internet Protocol (IP) packets, between networked systems.
Which basically means any consumer com
$500 (Score:2)
I didn't know there were routers completely made in the US still. What are they, $500 for a basic router?
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I might have an old [1]IMP [wikipedia.org] lying around somewhere. Anything newer? Not likely.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interface_Message_Processor