BT misses deadline for removing Huawei from network core
- Reference: 1704201310
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/01/02/bt_missed_deadline_for_removing/
- Source link:
Britain's telecoms operators were [1]served with formal legal notices by the government in November 2022, detailing their obligations to expunge kit from China-based Huawei, after the company was deemed a security risk.
As part of this, the companies were given a deadline of December 31, 2023 to cease using Huawei kit in their core networks. This was an extension from the previous deadline of January 28, 2023, which a number of operators (including BT) had complained they would struggle to meet.
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Yet it appears that BT has now failed to meet this extended deadline, although the company claims that only a tiny fraction of the voice and data services it carries are now affected.
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"All 4G and 5G data sessions and voice calls are now delivered by non-Huawei core equipment – meaning that over 99 percent of all core traffic is now being served by non-Huawei kit," a BT Group spokesperson told The Register in a statement.
The only voice and data services yet to be migrated are 2G and 3G, which accounts for less than 1 percent of its total traffic, the company claimed, adding that "We're working hard to complete this work."
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It is understood that telecoms operators face being fined up to 10 percent of their turnover for failing to comply with the legal notice, or in the case of a continuing contravention, £100,000 ($126,611) per day.
However, any such action is unlikely to be taken immediately, as the country's telecoms regulator Ofcom has first to report on the progress that network operators have made on meeting these goals, and the relevant report is not due until 31 March this year.
"Government is responsible for setting and enforcing the rules requiring certain telecoms companies to remove Huawei equipment from their networks. Ofcom's role is to gather information on companies' progress and report this to Government," an Ofcom spokesperson told us today.
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BT, which says it will provide more information to Ofcom with regard to regulation compliance, told us it has not formally requested an extension to the deadline.
However, some industry observers expect that there may be some flexibility on deadlines to avoid fines falling on companies that have made efforts to comply.
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"I fully expect moves to extend it further to avoid any fines," telecoms analyst Paolo Pescatore at PP Foresight told us. "It underlines how reliant BT has been on Huawei and the complexities of removing a vendor entirely from both its fixed line and mobile networks," Pescatore added.
"The task should not be underestimated to ensure minimal disruption to all users (across all telcos), but mindful especially of EE's Emergency Services Network obligations," he said.
Mobile network operator EE is a brand within the BT Group.
BT had [11]previously stated that complying with the requirement to remove Huawei from its network would cost it an estimated £500 million ($632 million) between 2020 and 2025. All Huawei equipment must be removed entirely from the UK's 5G networks by the end of 2027.
It is not yet clear if other telecoms operators have failed to meet the deadline relating to their core networks. We asked around, but had not received responses by the time of publication. All will likely be made clear by Ofcom's report in March. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2022/10/13/uk_telcos_huawei_ban/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZZRBNhh0vpRzNWX4mDQ3cAAAAUc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
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[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZZRBNhh0vpRzNWX4mDQ3cAAAAUc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
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[7] https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/02/huawei_chair_2024_letter/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/29/mobile_industry_looks_to_6g/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/19/congress_eu_dma_complaint/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/18/national_grid_bans_china_equipment/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2020/01/30/bt_uk_huawei_costs/
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Remember the days when...
I think you should re-read what I actually wrote, at the link you provided, including the thread context. You crow that BT has admitted that some of the 2G and 3G CN is Huawei boxes. But the discussion was about 5G.
Did you read where I wrote that CESG made the ruling in *2016*?Tell me, how much new *2G* kit was BT buying in 2016? I differentiated provision as to whether Huawei was providing RAN, eNodeB, or CN? Perhaps you could enlighten me what a 2G eNodeB looks like? Or a 3G eNodeB? The thread doesn’t even make sense of having the right network elements, if the discussion was about 2G. It’s not even meaningful to worry *specifically* about the Core Network in 3G, because the RAN is capable of decrypting data anyway. RANs are just as much a security threat as Core Network in 3G.
My point was *clearly* about 4G kit being procured to maintain current networks, and 5G for future networks. The discussion in Parliament and elsewhere has all been around Huawei’s role in 5G. The new security architecture refers to the 5G security architecture. Non-trusted Non-CN threat has been addressed in 5G, by re-architecting. There is no Huawei 5G problem, and never has been.
Re: Remember the days when...
You wrote:
"Lawful Intercept only exists in the Core Network. The West has *never* bought any Core Network boxes from Huawei. Huawei provide only Radio Access Nodes, and eNodeB."
BT's Huawei core was from 2G to 5G. No "g's will salvage that claim from being blatantly false. There's only one way to read this. Period.
Re: Remember the days when...
You've got to remember that China pays a lot of people to shill for them in online forums.
They're known as wumao, or the 50-cent army.
Given OFCOM's track record, they have about as much spine as a jellyfish so I doubt we'll see any actual fines being issued any time soon.
Two options
1) Get rid of the 2G and 3G kit, buy replacement kit at a significant capital cost
or
2) Wait for a bit, declare that 2G and 3G are to be removed from the BT system imminently, dump now redundant hardware and have no capital outlay.
Now, let's look at the declared future of 2G and 3G delivery and ask ourselves, why would they even bother replacing the kit?
Re: Two options
They have already done option 2
https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/19/bt_confirms_nationwide_3g_switch/
3G is to be switched off between January [now] and March 2024.
2G, I suspect will stay around a bit longer.
Re: Two options
They're keeping 2G on? It's been shut down for years in the US. Most of the 3G network was shut down last year.
Abusing Lawful Interception wiretapping probes...
... [1]is trivial if you're already part of the core network ( [2]slides ).
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkUN_8Lv86I
[2] https://media.blackhat.com/bh-us-10/presentations/Cross/BlackHat-USA-2010-Cross-Internet-Wiretapping-slides.pdf
All data and voice calls are now directly delivered to Utah /s
“All 4G and 5G data sessions and voice calls are now delivered by non-Huawei core equipment” .. plugged directly into the NSA Data Farm” ;)
So...
...When is the rip out of Cisco et al. hardware happening?
If the worry is government level spying, well the US have been proven to do such with their hardware but as of yet there has been no actual proof of anything with huawei gear.
Not saying its not happening, but that its a two way street, so why the singling out other than non specific fear mongering that China is bad, you don't need to know how, just that they are bad.
Re: So...
Given the findings of sloppy development practice in successive annual reports by the UK Huawei Oversight Board, it's open to question whether huawei would be capable of implementing viable backdoors in their kit. But anyway, as practically all comms kit (regardless of brand) is built in China, what's to stop backdoors being inserted into any kit?
Remember the days when...
... [1]people in this forum were claiming that Huawei backdoor fears were unjustified because, allegedly, no UK operators were running Huawei core networks ?
Well now, we learn that BT was one of them.
#JustTheFacts
[1] https://forums.theregister.com/forum/all/2023/09/29/huawei_sky_mobile_outages/#c_4736054