Huawei Responds To Android Ban With Service and Security Guarantees, But Its Future Remains Unclear (techcrunch.com) 167
Huawei has finally gone on the record about a ban on its use of Android, but the company's long-term strategy on mobile still remains unclear. From a report: In an effort to appease its worried customer base, the embattled Chinese company said today that it will continue to provide security updates and after-sales support to its existing lineup of smartphones, but it's what the company didn't say that will spark concerns. Huawei was unable to make guarantees about whether existing customers will continue to receive Android software updates, while its statement is bereft of any mention of whether future phones will ship with the current flavor of Android or something else.
[...] Huawei's lukewarm response isn't unexpected. Earlier, Google issued a similarly non-committal statement that indicated that owners of Huawei phones will continue to be able to access the Google Play Store and Google Play Protect, but -- like the Chinese firm -- it made no mention of the future, and that really is the key question. Further reading: Qualcomm and Intel reportedly stop dealing with Huawei.
[...] Huawei's lukewarm response isn't unexpected. Earlier, Google issued a similarly non-committal statement that indicated that owners of Huawei phones will continue to be able to access the Google Play Store and Google Play Protect, but -- like the Chinese firm -- it made no mention of the future, and that really is the key question. Further reading: Qualcomm and Intel reportedly stop dealing with Huawei.
should we... (Score:1, Troll)
Please show some proof before enacting economic warfare.
Re: should we... (Score:1, Interesting)
Google wants it's store and its UI to be prevalent so people don't know there are choices. China doesn't care about Google at all. If Google were smart, Google would follow huaweis lead not be petulant in a corner. How to become irrelevant quickly: remove your product from a Chinese mass producers product. Good job dumbasses
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Google wants it's store and its UI to be prevalent so people don't know there are choices.
This is the best way to educate the masses. China can just create their own state-approved app store, and they probably already had one provided by Google. They allowed Google, but they don't need Google for anything. They should still have the data, so a new app store can be up and running by tomorrow. If they also get rid of advertising, they can make it way more attractive too.
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Re: should we... (Score:2, Interesting)
Obviously you are an idiot and don't know what's going on in the world. El Presidente Trump has issued an order and put Huawei on a banned list. US companies may not do business with them. Google is a US company Mr. Derp.
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Re: should we... (Score:1, Flamebait)
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Some of us get admiring compliments from our boss about being 'the most intelligent person I've ever worked with'.
Doesn't mean we have common sense, but raw intelligence counts for a lot.
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Most of the world don't however live in America.
My choices:
1 - buy cheap Chinese phone, possibly get spied on by China
2 - buy expensive Korean phone, probably get spied on by America
3 - buy expensive American phone, definitely get spied on by America
When America can't compete on technology it sure as fuck isn't going to win on price or privacy.
Who can you trust? I trust Huawei more than google (Score:2)
Most of the world don't however live in America.
My choices:
1 - buy cheap Chinese phone, possibly get spied on by China
2 - buy expensive Korean phone, probably get spied on by America
3 - buy expensive American phone, definitely get spied on by America
When America can't compete on technology it sure as fuck isn't going to win on price or privacy.
Perhaps the idiotic Subject: prevented you from getting the favorable mod points you deserved? But you left off:
4 - buy a Nokia phone from Finland, who doesn't want to spy on anyone!
Whoops! I forgot. Another case of the nice guy finishing last. And no one is going to accuse Microsoft of being a nice guy (no matter how repentant Bill Gates has become).
However I'm not sure if getting spied on by Amazon isn't the worse case of all. The corporate cancers really are running amok, and their so-called principles a
Google is no longer an international company, eh? (Score:2)
The AC's comment moderated into visibility was the only detectable comment that mentioned this important aspect of the situation.
It is not fully clear to me if the Google had to take this action to follow the American law, but it is absolutely clear that NO "foreign" company can count on the google now. Whenever some crazy diktat comes down from Trump, they may suddenly find their business threatened.
Now that makes me wonder: Why did the google target Huawei rather than ALL Chinese smartphone makers?
Per my
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China already bans the top 3 Google services within China. So it's alright for China to display it's blatantly clone Googles top 3 app services and then prevent any external competition but when the US government returns the favor it's actions are wrong? China breaks every rule in the book when it comes to international trade and when the US finally calls them on it the US is doing something wrong? China has built it's entire economy on currency manipulation, IP violations, copyright violations, and state s
Re:should we... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Snowden demonstrated that CIA, NSA, etc. are constantly spying on us with the cooperation of telecoms. /. page up a few stories is one about how Facebook sells all of your data (location, data use, social circles, etc.) to the highest bidder (that would be telecoms and our government.)
On this same
Is there any evidence Huawei has done any spying for government or corporations? Any evidence... at all? (I'm sure that if there was any, it would be Trumpeted from the White House)
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Reeducation camps...
You mean like the "camps" for minorities seeking asylum?
You mean like our prison system which locks up black and brown people?
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Using the atrocities of the past, with no perpetrators alive and which no one can change, to excuse the atrocities of the present is about one of the most sickening forms of mental gymnastics one can perform. I suggest you reevaluate your worldview.
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It is obvious that you are here with the sole intent of defending the largest fascist government ever to exist (which is what China became when they adopted market economics, but kept the full blown authoritarianism). Here are my presumptions about you: you're either a card carrying Marxist or a paid agitator.
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Snowden demonstrated that CIA, NSA, etc. are constantly spying on us with the cooperation of telecoms.
Exactly... and without the cooperation of telecoms as well.
Most nations 'spy' on their own people and even share the information with their friends in NATO etc. When I say 'spy' I mean gather a lot of uncorrelated information that can be searched for specific identifiers at a later time. If you at some point become a person of interest then they can go back and look you up in the giant pile of uncorrelated data and see what you've been up to.
Now, given that your own intelligence service most certainly is sp
Re: should we... (Score:2)
No evidence that the Chinese are spying on US citizens. None.
Lots of evidence Facebook, Google, CIA, etc. are spying on us.
Re: should we... (Score:2)
I'm not going to side with China too strongly here, but remember that America is the incarceration leader of the world, and cops can pull you over and take all the money in your car or take stuff out of your house under civil asset forfeiture powers and never give it back. I think your claim mostly passes muster here, but let's not be too self-righteous.
Riiiiight (Score:2)
That's why the US has more prisoners than china, despite having a third of China's population. Check your western exceptionalism...
Re: should we... (Score:2)
Yes, of course Emperor Xi spies on everyone who uses a Chinese made phone. However I do not live in China, nor do I have any plans to visit. So I am not terribly concerned.
Yes, of course Uncle Sam spies on everyone who uses a phone running American software. Since I do live in America, this is a greater concern.
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China is bound to retaliate. Ban Apple products in China maybe?
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China is bound to retaliate. Ban Apple products in China maybe?
Why Apple products? That's like bombing S-Korea to stop N-Korea from developing a nuclear program. Presumably the Chinese would want to get back at Google. So the logical thing to do would be to ban all imported phones that run Google's version of Android, but don't let me stop you from having wet dreams of Apple being made to suffer in China for Google's actions.
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Google is already banned from China. You can't use Android there, all the Google services it relies on are blocked. Chinese phones running "Android" are running a custom OS based on AOSP and their own search, app store, location services etc.
Apple is the most well known US brand in China and iPhones are quite popular. It would be similar to banning Huawei, the flagship Chinese brand.
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Google is already banned from China. You can't use Android there, all the Google services it relies on are blocked. Chinese phones running "Android" are running a custom OS based on AOSP and their own search, app store, location services etc.
Apple is the most well known US brand in China and iPhones are quite popular. It would be similar to banning Huawei, the flagship Chinese brand.
A simple Google search (irony abounds) revealed that in China you can either (a) use a VPN to access Google services (b) side-load replacement apps provided by local Chinese competitors of Google on a bog standard Android phone. Losing Google's services is not the end fo the world (I don't use any of them and I'm still alive). Android currently has a 73.24% market share in China. Banning Android as an OS would have a very definite effect since a whole bunch of phone manufacturers would have to ditch Android
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Just to clarify, Android without Google apps is technically not Android. To use the name it has to be certified by Google and have some Google services installed. What they use is based on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and they are not allowed to market it as Android.
But as you say, it is at its core Android.
Can confirm VPNs work, although you need one that can bypass the firewall.
Apple is the GOOGLE's target, not Trump's (Score:2)
Already 3/4 o'clock on the Slashdot, and this seems to be the closest approach to insight? Really? (The lack of insightful mod points and the original meaningless Subject: are just par for the course of Slashdot these years...)
Yeah, I know I'm slow witted these years, and I know the clock runs too fast for deep discussions here... But it still bothers me when I think I remember more thoughtful times of yore.
Seems obvious to me that China is going to get seriously pissed now and they are going to do somethin
It's not Google, it's the US (Trump) (Score:1)
Trump just made it illegal for Google to do business with Huawei. It's part of his trade war with China.
"China may force Huawei to do it's bidding", says Trump. While forcing Google to do his bidding...
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Buy your product and technology only from medium size country, like Korea,Japan,Germany that don't have the idea that ruling the world is their birth right.
Given that in the last century two of those three have tried to establish a global empire based on precisely that supposition you may need to rethink your recommendation.
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Should we try to ban all CIA/FBI/NSA/etc-infested US companies?
If your nation is not an ally of the US then I would argue that doing so would be very prudent.
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What makes you being an ally of the USA any safer? The USA certainly hasn't shown to not spy on their allies (Germany). They certainly haven't shown that they wouldn't start economic wars with their allies (the EU). And recently they have even shown not to be friendly in warfare to allies (intelligence sharing with the UK).
You don't need to be an ally to the USA to be safer. You need to be an outright lapdog. Don't worry USA we in Australia don't fear you, oh and what do you want us to do next?
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Definitely! Huawei should move to Saudi Arabia if they want to do business in the US
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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You mean a 'building'?
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Re:should we... (No, but.. "transparent" source) (Score:1)
No. Neither should we do nothing. Whether it is Chinese cell phone companies or US software companies (Huawei/Microsoft), they both provide opaque systems which are difficult too impossible to audit as currently provided. Even worse, they both are in the position to fundamentally change how their products work via essentially "forced" security updates. With a little prior planning, they could even leave in an obscure security bug and then secretly release it to the "hacker" community in order to encour
Re:should we... (Score:4, Insightful)
You know despite all the news coverage, I have never seen a Huawei phone. Perhaps are European friends have more exposure to them. But in the States (At least my area of the states), we have Apple, Samsung, LG, and even a few ZTE.
Back to your point. Most of the other products, are made in countries with free enterprise, who are less likely to risk their reputation for the country they operate in. Companies like Huawei work with the permission from the Chinese government, and under very tight levels of control, to a point where if they have to sacrifice their reputation, from the country saying do this, they will.
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Huawei phones are quite popular in Europe. They are pushing to overtake Samsung in some markets.
China.. Sigh (Score:2)
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I think we need to tackle the opium epidemic before we worry about a Chinese phone maker.
Why do we have to do these in sequential order? The two are pretty much unrelated, why should we wait to do one before doing the other, instead of doing both?
There are those who might be inclined to listen to you about the opium epidemic. Unfortunately they can't hear you underneath all that fucking money flowing from Big Pharma. The real epidemic, is Greed.
Completing the move to offtopic.
Scarcity (Score:2)
Why do we have to do these in sequential order? The two are pretty much unrelated, why should we wait to do one before doing the other, instead of doing both?
In some cases, I think not wanting to tackle too many unrelated problems at the same time is related to a lack of budget. If you can't afford both, then out of what you can afford, pick what gives the best bang for buck.
Locked bootloader (Score:2)
and buy a new one GOOGLEFREE. Awesome.
The problem is that Huawei is starting to lock the bootloader on more recent phone.
Thus, it's not like you'd be able to install LineageOS on it, you'd instead be limited to whatever AOSP-derivative came with the phone, including Huawei's alternative app shop (not necessarily F-Droid you might be dreaming about) and whatever chinese bloatware/malware/backdoor the local government asks them to provide.
You're basically swapping Google obtrusiveness (and probably NSA tie-in) with the Chinese equivalent.
What you
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Before all this mess happened, I lost interest in ever owning a Huawei phone when they actively said they were locking bootloaders, and patching existing devices to lock them, with no way for a buyer to unlock them. This is not what a company should do when people are concerned they have something to hide.
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What you would be dreaming about is a phone with an unlock-able boot loader that allows you to install LineageOS.
(e.g.: Some Sony Xperia do).
I thought all Xperia Android phones had bootloader unlock. Regardless, all Lenovorola Android phones do, if they are not carrier locked. I unlocked my E2 right away back in the day, because updates were lagging. I seldom use it for anything any more, but it's running Pixel Experience. Now I have an X4, which I'm not unlocking because the updates are timely so far. It's running Pie, there have been a couple of security OTAs since the Pie OTA, and they even claim they will have Android Q for it. When support
Carrier (Score:2)
I thought all Xperia Android phones had bootloader unlock.
Same as your other example: not the carrier-locked.
Also, some older firmware used to store the camera image-processing stuff on the same TA partition that's get fried on unlock to protect the DRM keys.
So on some older firmware, the camera image quality used to go b0rked upon unlocking.
Apparently it is fixed somewhere around 8.1 Oreo or 9.0 Pie.
Personally, I don't give a damn, I installed Sailfish OS on my Xperias.
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Android is Open Source software. Put someone in charge of ensuring LineageOS support, release phones with just LineageOS, no Google apps and services. Offer your substitute app store and services separately.
Merely "open source" isn't good enough to make the operation transparent when the hardware it's running on is compromised.
Apps. (Score:2)
Offer your substitute app store and services separately.
Which already what they are doing in China.
The problem isn't here.
The problem is with the Apps.
People are addicted to certain specific apps, some of which can only be found on Google Play Store, because said app in turn are addicted to the Google Play Service blob that Google provides to collaborating manufacturer (and which is the thing that Huawei actually got banned from now).
People will complain that their favorite app isn't available on the "Huawei app shop".
Either the end-users would need to jump thro
Open-source alternative: MicroG (Score:2)
And I'll post that link as a non-google opensurce alternative: https://microg.org/ [microg.org]
(Here [shadow53.com] are some website introduction to these stuff)
Hwawei was built on stolen goods. (Score:5, Interesting)
Hwawei was built on tech stolen from Cisco and Nortel, plenty of documentation of this. And the thievery was done by hacking, especially Nortel. They've done it before, and I'm convinced they'll do it again. Why create when you can steal, right?
My god, people *defend* them! People in (what used to be) a pretty nerdy tech forum defend them! What, did you all forget about the thievery?
Build your house with stolen bricks, don't be shocked when they get knocked down. To hell with Hwawei.
Re:Hwawei was built on stolen goods. (Score:5, Interesting)
It was a combination of hacking and physical theft when businesses were stupid enough to start manufacturing their products in China. These same businesses are now competing with the people that they trained that then stole their inventions and market share. This was warned about at the time but big businesses all thought they could have the slave labor and create markets there. In reality, the move to China for manufacturing meant first the end to union labor's viability and then to those same company's viability. Only countries that saw the threat and did not allow it to happen were not devastated. And of course the same people that caused the problem are now in power again claiming that the solution is to further erode worker's rights and consumer protections. The race to the bottom is not remotely safe nor sustainable.
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Have you looked at the stuff they are supposed to have "stolen"? It's a bunch of header files. They look like they came with the compiler suite. The claims are pretty dubious, even Cisco's own expert admitted as much.
The settlement was for Huawei to remove a few lines of code, with the court stipulating that Cisco could not bring any similar complaints about Huawei in future.
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Build your house with stolen bricks, don't be shocked when they get knocked down. To hell with Hwawei.
I'll just leave this [reuters.com] here.
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IBM provided computers to Nazis. Where's the outrage!
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Stealing tech from companies around the world has been a prudent trademark of US companies. They call it business. It is a reason the US educates more lawyers than engineers. US companies think's it is their sole right to abuse the patent system. They have done it to the extent that it is destroyed as a system. So I guess what goes around comes around.
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Huawei needs to unlock their bootloaders... (Score:5, Interesting)
How can we have faith in Huawei when they went full bore with bootloader locks and not allowing unlocks and actively hunting down exploits? If they want to gain trust with people, they need to allow LineageOS and other open ROMs to run on their devices.
If they did offer an open bootloader along the line of Nexus/Pixel phones, an open source kernel with the SoC modules in source, or at least easily fetchable as binary blobs, Huawei might be able to something completely ironic, and get a market of people who are worried about privacy. Especially if LineageOS could come on the devices from the factory. If Huawei can earn people's trust, ban or no ban, people would buy their devices explicitly.
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How can we have faith in Huawei when they went full bore with bootloader locks and not allowing unlocks and actively hunting down exploits?
Because they have shown to take an industry standard approach that is taken by every other handset vendor. Frankly if they didn't do the above I'd wonder what is wrong with them and why they aren't following the footsteps of every other vendor.
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If Huawei can earn people's trust, ban or no ban, people would buy their devices explicitly.
Granted. But that suggest the question... can they? There's always that part of the phone for which you cannot have the source, the radio. If you believe that they're part of a spying effort, then you can never, ever trust them. It really depends on whether the people who care about security care so much that they won't trust anything that says Huawei on it.
Obvs it's pretty much irrelevant since all of this stuff is being made in China. But I don't know that Huawei's name isn't bad enough now that they can'
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actively hunting down exploits?
Erm. I want my hardware providers to do this.
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If Huawei started taking an active part in xda-developers (not just offering unlockable bootloaders, but offering the ability to make custom ROMs and other tools, perhaps even allowing people to use the phones for SBCs like Raspberry Pis, they would gain a definite niche.)
Especially if they made a specific phone designed to be open and tinkerer friendly. If they did this, Huawei would gain a cult following that would always champion them. However, I don't think this meshes with the management's way of thi
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A national security letter can include a gag order that means publishing the letter would put Tim cook in Jail...
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I believe that was covered under
legal consequences in federal court with due process
This will be interesting... (Score:3)
Huawei is quite popular in Europe. I think this may be quite a concern for Google, since a lot of companies will probably try to sideload onto another app store for huawei users, if they can't get the play store, amongst other things. Certainly european companies will look into alternatives for their apps, after all, the code is already there. Now this is exactly what google doesn't want in Europe; a reason for users to see that non-google android can work, particularly after the anti-trust findings recently.The play store is the only feature of the google experience that really prevents any fork from being successful.
If an alternative app store gains traction, then google's domination of smartphones will prove to be significantly harder to maintain. I suspect that google knows this, and are going to try hard to skirt around the compliance of this ban.
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Huawei is quite popular in Europe. ... which has significant higher population, depending where you draw the line between Asia and Europe, anyway :P
It is also quite popular in Asia
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Doesn't really matter where you draw the line, you're going to include at least one of India and China and either alone would be enough, let alone the rest of the continent.
Europe's still however the better place to live.
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Hmm. Xiaomi, Asus, Samsung and who are the other two? Apple I guess.
Aren't Honor a Huawei brand? I think they're a top 5.
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Google (Score:2)
Due to profits-related reason, as an End-user, Google can allow you to register and obtain a license to install "Google Play Services" and Google's "Play Store" on a smartphone that doesn't have it.
opengapps.com is an easy way to download the actual blobs.
Google tries to make it easy for google-free users to jump back into the shark's mouth.
That's probably what most Europeans will side-load on Huawei phones.
---
Now as a separate option, there exists a completely Google-free solution :
- MicroG [microg.org] is an opensourc
opengapps.ORG (Score:2)
I was curious. Opened the .com... it's NOT the one you want.
Year of the Linux Mobile Operating System! (Score:2)
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Oh no they didn't . . . . (Score:2)
Use FOSS alternatives (Score:2)
If Huawei wasn't obligated to spy for Beijing, one thing they could have done would have been making a phone w/ Replicant. Since that's not an option, maybe they could try out open source projects, like Jolla's Sailfish OS, or the KDE's Plasma Mobile. The Chinese do have their own spins of Linux, right? So they should be able to make a mobile version of it fit for Huawei. This assumes that they can make stuff on their own w/o having to lean on Western companies to steal their IP
LineageOS (Score:2)
their best bet now is to make sure it is very, very easy to get LineageOS running on their phones.