CW+ Premium Content/Computer Weekly

In what is effectively a huge U-turn to the decision it took only in January 2020, the UK government has made its long-expected decision to remove Huawei technology from the country’s growing 5G communications infrastructure, announcing that it is to commit to a timetable for the removal of Huawei equipment from the 5G network by 2027. In a House of Commons statement, UK culture secretary Oliver Dowden said the decision was taken after the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) reviewed the consequences of the decision by the US government on 15 May to extend its restrictions on the sale of hardware and software to so-called “high-risk” suppliers such as Huawei, leading to the Chinese comms tech giant not being able to purchase equipment from longstanding suppliers. Dowden said the NCSC believes that the move has created uncertainly around the Huawei supply chain, and that the UK can no longer be confident it would be able to guarantee the security of future Huawei 5G equipment. To that end, it was making it illegal for UK ...