Skip to main content
  • Sections
  • Search

Center for Strategic & International Studies

User menu

  • Subscribe
  • Sign In

Topics

  • Climate Change
  • Cybersecurity and Technology
    • Cybersecurity
    • Data Governance
    • Intellectual Property
    • Intelligence, Surveillance, and Privacy
    • Military Technology
    • Space
    • Technology and Innovation
  • Defense and Security
    • Counterterrorism and Homeland Security
    • Defense Budget
    • Defense Industry, Acquisition, and Innovation
    • Defense Strategy and Capabilities
    • Geopolitics and International Security
    • Long-Term Futures
    • Missile Defense
    • Space
    • Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation
  • Economics
    • Asian Economics
    • Global Economic Governance
    • Trade and International Business
  • Energy and Sustainability
    • Energy, Climate Change, and Environmental Impacts
    • Energy and Geopolitics
    • Energy Innovation
    • Energy Markets, Trends, and Outlooks
  • Global Health
    • Family Planning, Maternal and Child Health, and Immunizations
    • Multilateral Institutions
    • Health and Security
    • Infectious Disease
  • Human Rights
    • Building Sustainable and Inclusive Democracy
    • Business and Human Rights
    • Responding to Egregious Human Rights Abuses
    • Civil Society
    • Transitional Justice
    • Human Security
  • International Development
    • Food and Agriculture
    • Governance and Rule of Law
    • Humanitarian Assistance
    • Human Mobility
    • Private Sector Development
    • U.S. Development Policy

Regions

  • Africa
    • North Africa
    • Sub-Saharan Africa
  • Americas
    • Caribbean
    • North America
    • South America
  • Arctic
  • Asia
    • Afghanistan
    • Australia, New Zealand & Pacific
    • China
    • India
    • Japan
    • Korea
    • Pakistan
    • Southeast Asia
  • Europe
    • European Union
    • NATO
    • Post-Soviet Europe
    • Turkey
  • Middle East
    • The Gulf
    • Egypt and the Levant
    • North Africa
  • Russia and Eurasia
    • The South Caucasus
    • Central Asia
    • Post-Soviet Europe
    • Russia

Sections menu

  • Programs
  • Experts
  • Events
  • Analysis
    • Blogs
    • Books
    • Commentary
    • Congressional Testimony
    • Critical Questions
    • Interactive Reports
    • Journals
    • Newsletter
    • Reports
    • Transcript
  • Podcasts
  • iDeas Lab
  • Transcripts
  • Web Projects

Main menu

  • About Us
  • Support CSIS
    • Securing Our Future
Photo: EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images
Commentary
Share
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Email
  • Printfriendly.com

5G: To Ban or Not to Ban? It's Not Black or White

April 24, 2019

Reports that Prime Minister Theresa May will let Huawei supply antennas and other “noncore” infrastructure to the UK 5G networks but not to the telecommunications core may prompt an outpouring of muddled speculation. We can consider some of the more confusing issues.

This decision does not mean that the United States and its allies are "split" over Huawei. All major allies agree that using Huawei equipment is risky. Where there is disagreement, it is over how to manage that risk. The United Kingdom wants to take a middle position, not a full ban but also not ceding control or critical networks to Huawei and China. Many European countries already use Huawei for their 4G networks, and it is much cheaper and faster to simply overlay 5G onto this existing infrastructure.

The United Kingdom has argued that they can manage the risk created by Huawei by blocking the use of any Huawei equipment around sensitive facilities (like defense installations or Whitehall), restricting its use in other areas to the "edge" of the 5G network, and keeping it out of the "core." This reduces, but does not eliminate, the possibility of 5G service disruption or intelligence collection by the Chinese government. Other European countries are also considering this solution since it avoids irritating the Chinese government, which will retaliate for a complete ban (as it did by punishing Australia over its ban, and China's coercive behavior is one reason that people do not want to be dependent on Huawei).

A simple way to describe this risk reduction strategy is that wireless networks can be divided into two parts: the edge, where your handset connects via radio signals to a wireless base station; and the core, where the base station connects (often using fiber optic cable) to powerful routers and other computer equipment that handle millions of messages per minute to let your call connect to other subscribers. The best place for intelligence advantage is at the core, which is one reason why Huawei is, in the words of one European telecom executive, "desperate" to get in it. The UK decision frustrates this Chinese goal.

Huawei can offer massive discounts to gain access to the core, and many countries will be tempted. It is rumored that Huawei offered Italy a discount of more than 80 percent off the market price to use its equipment. Huawei can do this because it is subsidized by the Chinese government, which has two reasons for these subsidies. The first is to gain intelligence advantage, by controlling telecom network's core. The second is to drive competitors to form the market using predatory pricing. The World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) failure to confront this predatory pricing is one of its most important failures.

Huawei wants a monopoly, and the Chinese government supports this because it will give them a global signals intelligence network. China is not offering Italy massive subsidies because it admires Italian cuisine. But one part of the discussion that is often left out is that telecom operators—the phone companies—do not want a Huawei monopoly. Even Chinese telecom companies try to avoid relying on Huawei. This is not because of intelligence risk but a reasonable concern that Huawei would use monopoly power to charge exorbitant prices. Just as the commercial airline market has two competitors so that buyers can play them off against each other, the competitors are forced to compete and innovate; there will need to be more than one telecom supplier, and that other supplier cannot be Chinese.

The question is whether a partial ban on Huawei to keep it out of sensitive areas and the telecom core will work to reduce risk. The only answer is "not proven." Both core and edge functions will become more important as 5G enables many more things than your phone—self-driving cars, telemedicine, smart cities, and the likes—and letting Huawei in, even at the edge, could provide China with opportunities for mischief.

There was probably a sigh of relief in many European capitals when the report of the UK decision emerged because the UK proposal gives them a way to avoid provoking China without entirely caving in on security. This is not a complete victory for Huawei—their brand may be irrevocably damaged—nor a defeat for the United States. It is a first step in the longer saga of dealing with China as a strategic competitor.

James Andrew Lewis is a senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

Commentary is produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).

© 2019 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. All rights reserved.

Written By
James Andrew Lewis
Senior Vice President and Director, Strategic Technologies Program
Media Queries
Contact H. Andrew Schwartz
Chief Communications Officer
Tel: 202.775.3242

Contact Paige Montfort
Media Relations Coordinator, External Relations
Tel: 202.775.3173
Related
5G Networks, Commentaries, Critical Questions, and Newsletters, Cybersecurity, Cybersecurity and Technology, Innovation and Digital Transformation, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Privacy, Strategic Technologies Program

Most Recent From James Andrew Lewis

Upcoming Event
CANCELED: Surveying the US-EU Trade and Technology Council (TTC) State of Play
July 12, 2022
Commentary
Semiconductors and Security
By James Andrew Lewis
June 28, 2022
Commentary
Cyber Crime and Antitrust
By James Andrew Lewis
June 22, 2022
On Demand Event
The Future of Quantum – Powering the Innovation Ecosystem from the Private Sector
June 21, 2022
In the News
Anticipated Roe Reversal Brings Wave Data Security Reforms
The Washington Post | Joseph Marks
June 16, 2022
On Demand Event
'Never Trust, Always Verify': Federal Migration to ZTA and Endpoint Security
June 16, 2022
Report
Cyber War and Ukraine
By James Andrew Lewis
June 16, 2022
Report
“Never Trust, Always Verify”: Federal Migration to ZTA and Endpoint Security
By Emily Harding, James Andrew Lewis, Suzanne Spaulding, Rose Butchart, Jake Harrington, Devi Nair
June 16, 2022
View all content by this expert
Footer menu
  • Topics
  • Regions
  • Programs
  • Experts
  • Events
  • Analysis
  • Web Projects
  • Podcasts
  • iDeas Lab
  • Transcripts
  • About Us
  • Support Us
Contact CSIS
Email CSIS
Tel: 202.887.0200
Fax: 202.775.3199
Visit CSIS Headquarters
1616 Rhode Island Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
Media Queries
Contact H. Andrew Schwartz
Chief Communications Officer
Tel: 202.775.3242

Contact Paige Montfort
Media Relations Coordinator, External Relations
Tel: 202.775.3173

Daily Updates

Sign up to receive The Evening, a daily brief on the news, events, and people shaping the world of international affairs.

Subscribe to CSIS Newsletters

Follow CSIS
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
  • Instagram

All content © 2022. All rights reserved.

Legal menu
  • Credits
  • Privacy Policy
  • Reprint Permissions