Chinese vendor Huawei has appointed Donald “Andy” Purdy as its chief security officer in the US as it tries to counter Washington’s security concerns around the company, according to a report in the Washington Post.
Huawei has effectively been…
Chinese vendor Huawei has appointed Donald “Andy” Purdy as its chief security officer in the US as it tries to counter Washington’s security concerns around the company, according to a report in the Washington Post.
Huawei has effectively been shut out of the US due to concerns from politicians and the defence community about letting a Chinese company provide equipment for what is regarded as strategic infrastructure.
Last month the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee asked Huawei and fellow Chinese vendor ZTE for transparency over their relations with their government citing national security concerns.
In an attempt to break into the world’s largest telecoms market, Huawei is trying to convince the US that it is not a threat, and Purdy’s appointment appears to be part of this strategy.
Purdy was previously chief cyber security strategist at CSC, a technology solutions company. In the past Purdy has worked with the Department of Homeland Security , helping them to form the National Cyber Security Division. In 2003 he assisted the White House in drafting cyber-security policy and he is on the advisory board at George Mason University’s International Cyber Center (ICC), which helps lead efforts to better identify and address global cyber issues.
The US has lost its largest telecom equipment manufacturers – Lucent and Nortel – in the recent past and Huawei has to convince Washington it is not a threat to supply chain security.
“There’s a strong belief [in the US] that Huawei was created by the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) and still has strong ties with the Chinese Government and there’s considerable knowledge that China is engaged in cyber-espionage – that’s an accepted fact here,” James Andrew Lewis, a fellow at US think tank the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), said.
“When you put those two together – Chinese company building internet/telecommunications backbone when it has strong relations with people who engage in cyber-espionage – that’s just too much,” he said.
