The U.S. Federal Communications Commission moved toward barring China Unicom (Hong Kong) and ComNet from the U.S., calling the Chinese telecommunications carriers a security risk controlled by the Beijing government. From a report: The action against two of China's three major telecommunications operators was decided by a 4-0 vote by agency. It continues a security crackdown that earlier touched Chinese gear makers Huawei Technologies and ZTE. In 2019, the FCC barred China Mobile Ltd. from the U.S. market over national security concerns. ComNet, a subsidiary of Pacific Networks, and the unit formally known as China Unicom (Americas) Operations Ltd. were told in April by the FCC to show they are independent from the Chinese government, or face a proceeding that could result in ejection from the U.S. market. With its vote Wednesday the FCC began those proceedings. China Unicom and Pacific Networks are indirectly and ultimately owned and controlled by the government of the People's Republic of China, the FCC said in news releases Wednesday. The companies may present evidence in proceedings set in motion, according to the news releases.

Alibaba's internet browser has been removed from several app stores in China as the company's feud with the Chinese government continues. From a report: Android app stores including those operated by Huawei and Xiaomi have blocked downloads or removed Alibaba's "UC Browser," according to Huawei and Xiaomi phone owners who spoke to CNBC. However, one Samsung phone owner in China said they could still see the browser in Samsung's app store. The UC Browser is also still available on Apple's App Store. It comes after the UC Browser was criticized on a TV show, broadcast by state-owned broadcaster CCTV, about misleading online medical advertising. The show accused the browser of allowing private hospitals to bid for the names of China's best known hospitals in keyword searches. Thus potentially luring patients to their websites instead of the public hospitals they are supposed to visit.

Nokia on Tuesday announced plans to cut up to 10,000 jobs within two years to trim costs and invest more in research capabilities. Reuters reports: After taking over the top job last year, Chief Executive Pekka Lundmark has been making changes to recover from product missteps under the company's previous management that hurt its 5G ambitions and dragged on its shares. He announced a new strategy in October, under which Nokia will have four business groups and said the company would "do whatever it takes" to take the lead in 5G, as it banks on also capturing share from Huawei.

Lundmark is expected to present his long-term strategy, discuss action plans and set financial targets during the company's capital markets day on Thursday. The company said in a statement it expects about 600 million euros ($715 million) to 700 million euros of restructuring and associated charges by 2023. It expects the current restructuring to lower its cost base by about 600 million euros by the end of 2023. Half of the savings are expected to be realized in 2021. Nokia currently has 90,000 employees, and has cut thousands of jobs following its acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent in 2016.

Huawei will begin charging mobile giants like Apple a "reasonable" fee for access to its trove of wireless 5G patents, potentially creating a lucrative revenue source by showcasing its global lead in next-generation networking. From a report: The owner of the world's largest portfolio of 5G patents will negotiate rates and potential cross-licensing with the iPhone maker and Samsung Electronics, Chief Legal Officer Song Liuping said. It aims to get paid despite U.S. efforts to block its network gear and shut it out of the supply chain, but promised to charge lower rates than rivals like Qualcomm, Ericsson AB and Nokia Oyj. Huawei should rake in about $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion in patent and licensing fees between 2019 and 2021, executives said without specifying which of those stemmed from 5G. It's capping per-phone royalties at $2.50, according to Jason Ding, head of Huawei's intellectual property department. China's largest technology company by revenue wants a seat at the table with tech giants vying to define the rapidly evolving field of connected cars, smart homes and robotic surgery. Battles are unfolding over who profits from 5G that may dwarf the size and scope of the tech industry's first worldwide patent war -- the one over smartphones. But having only just become a major player in 5G standards boards, Huawei is now grappling with U.S. sanctions that have all but crippled its smartphone business and threaten to hamstring its networking division abroad.

Huawei is turning to technology for pig farmers as it deals with tough sanctions on its smartphones. From a report: The Chinese telecoms giant was stopped from accessing vital components after the Trump administration labelled it a threat to US national security. In response to struggling smartphone sales, Huawei is looking at other sources of revenue for its technology. Along with Artificial Intelligence (AI) tech for pig farmers, Huawei is also working with the coal mining industry. Former US President Donald Trump claimed Huawei can share customer data with the Chinese government, allegations it has repeatedly denied. As a result, the world's largest telecoms equipment maker has been limited to making 4G models as it lacks US government permission to import components for 5G models. Huawei's smartphone sales plunged 42% in the last quarter of 2020 as it struggled with a limited supply of microchips due to the sanctions. Huawei has also been locked out of the development of 5G in a number of countries, including the UK, amid fears over national security.

[...] China has the world's biggest pig farming industry and is home to half the world's live hogs. Technology is helping to modernise pig farms with AI being introduced to detect diseases and track pigs. Facial recognition technology can identify individual pigs, while other technology monitors their weight, diet and exercise. Huawei has already been developing facial recognition tech and faced criticism last month for a system that identifies people who appear to be of Uighur origin among images of pedestrians. Other Chinese tech giants, including JD.com and Alibaba, are already working with pig farmers in China to bring new technologies.

Some of the world's largest technology companies are complaining to U.S. antitrust regulators about Nvidia's acquisition of Arm because the deal will harm competition in an area of the industry that is vital to their businesses. Alphabet's Google, Microsoft and Qualcomm are among companies worried about the $40 billion deal and are asking antitrust officials to intervene, Bloomberg News reported Friday, following up on CNBC's report from earlier today that talked only about Qualcomm's efforts. At least one of the companies wants the deal killed, Bloomberg added. From the report: The acquisition would give Nvidia control over a critical supplier that licenses essential chip technology to the likes of Apple, Intel, Samsung Electronics, Amazon.com and China's Huawei Technologies. U.K.-based Arm is known as the Switzerland of the industry because it licenses chip designs and related software code to all comers, rather than competing against semiconductor companies. The concern is that if Nvidia owns Arm, it could limit rivals' access to the technology or raise the cost of access.

Rust -- the programming language, not the survival game -- now has a new home: the Rust Foundation. From a report: AWS, Huawei, Google, Microsoft and Mozilla banded together to launch this new foundation today and put a two-year commitment to a million-dollar budget behind it. This budget will allow the project to "develop services, programs, and events that will support the Rust project maintainers in building the best possible Rust." Rust started as a side project inside of Mozilla to develop an alternative to C/C++. Designed by Mozilla Research's Graydon Hore, with contributions from the likes of JavaScript creator Brendan Eich, Rust became the core language for some of the fundamental features of the Firefox browser and its Gecko engine, as well as Mozilla's Servo engine. Today, Rust is the most-loved language among developers. But with Mozilla's layoffs in recent months, many on the Rust team lost jobs and the future of the language became unclear without a main sponsor, though the project itself has thousands of contributors and a lot of corporate users, so the language itself wasn't going anywhere.

President Joe Biden's nominee for Commerce secretary, Gina Raimondo, said she knows of "no reason" why Huawei and other Chinese companies shouldn't remain on a restricted trade list. From a report: Raimondo, in written questions from Senate Republicans, was asked about the company, as well as Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co. and others. They are on a list that requires U.S. firms to obtain government licenses if they want to sell American tech and intellectual property to the companies. "I understand that parties are placed on the Entity List and the Military End User List generally because they pose a risk to U.S. national security or foreign policy interests," said Raimondo, the Democratic governor of Rhode Island. "I currently have no reason to believe that entities on those lists should not be there. If confirmed, I look forward to a briefing on these entities and others of concern."

AmiMoJo shares a report: Xiaomi has sued the U.S. Defense and Treasury departments, challenging a blacklisting that blocks American investors from buying the Chinese smartphone giant's securities. The lawsuit came after the Defense Department determined earlier this month that China's biggest smartphone maker was affiliated with the People's Liberation Army. Beijing-based Xiaomi called the blacklisting "unconstitutional" and seeks a court ruling to reverse the designation, which was made in the waning days of the Trump administration. "Xiaomi faces imminent, severe, and irreparable harm if the Designation remains in place and the restrictions take effect," the company said in the filing in the U.S. district court of Columbia. The lawsuit also named Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen as defendants. Under former President Donald Trump, the U.S. had targeted scores of Chinese tech companies citing national security. Huawei Technologies, one of the biggest rivals to Xiaomi in smartphone market, was cut off from its key suppliers as a result of a series of restrictions imposed by the former administration.

"Huawei, the crown jewel of China's technology industry, has suffered from a sustained American campaign to keep its equipment from being used in new 5G networks around the world," reports the New York Times. Now they've identified "a covert pro-Huawei influence campaign in Belgium about 5G networks." [Alternate URL here]

It began when trade lawyer Edwin Vermulst was paid to write an article criticizing a Belgian policy that would block Huawei from lucrative contracts: First, at least 14 Twitter accounts posing as telecommunications experts, writers and academics shared articles by Mr. Vermulst and many others attacking draft Belgium legislation that would limit "high risk" vendors like Huawei from building the country's 5G system, according to Graphika, a research firm that studies misinformation and fake social media accounts. The pro-Huawei accounts used computer-generated profile pictures, a telltale sign of inauthentic activity. Next, Huawei officials retweeted the fake accounts, giving the articles even wider reach to policymakers, journalists and business leaders. Kevin Liu, Huawei's president for public affairs and communications in Western Europe, who has a verified Twitter account with 1.1 million followers, shared 60 posts from the fake accounts over three weeks in December, according to Graphika. Huawei's official account in Europe, with more than five million followers, did so 47 times...

Twitter said it had removed the fake accounts after Graphika alerted it to the campaign on Dec. 30... Many of their followers appeared to be bots...

The effort suggests a new twist in social media manipulation, said Ben Nimmo, a Graphika investigator who helped identify the pro-Huawei campaign. Tactics once used mainly for government objectives — like Russia's interference in the 2016 American presidential election — are being adapted to achieve corporate goals. "It's business rather than politics," Mr. Nimmo said. "It's not one country targeting another country. It looks like an operation to promote a major multinational's interests — and to do it against a European state."
Though the social media campaign had little impact on Belgian policymakers, one telecom consultancy noted Huawei's fear that similar legislation "could spread to other parts of the world." (The article points out Belgium is the headquarters of both NATO and the European Union.)

But Phil Howard, the director of the Oxford Internet Institute, see a future where disinformation will become increasingly commercialized. "The flow of money is increasingly there," he tells the Times. "Large-scale social media influence operations are now part of the communications tool kit for any large global corporation."

Earlier this week security experts disclosed details on seven vulnerabilities impacting Dnsmasq, "a popular DNS software package that is commonly deployed in networking equipment, such as routers and access points," reports ZDNet. "The vulnerabilities tracked as DNSpooq, impact Dnsmasq, a DNS forwarding client for *NIX-based operating systems."

Slashdot reader Joe2020 shared Help Net Security's quote from Shlomi Oberman, CEO and researcher at JSOF. "Some of the bigger users of Dnsmasq are Android/Google, Comcast, Cisco, Red Hat, Netgear, and Ubiquiti, but there are many more. All major Linux distributions offer Dnsmasq as a package, but some use it more than others, e.g., in OpenWRT it is used a lot, Red Hat use it as part of their virtualization platforms, Google uses it for Android hotspots (and maybe other things), while, for example Ubuntu just has it as an optional package."

More from ZDNet: Dnsmasq is usually included inside the firmware of various networking devices to provide DNS forwarding capabilities by taking DNS requests made by local users, forwarding the request to an upstream DNS server, and then caching the results once they arrive, making the same results readily available for other clients without needing to make a new DNS query upstream. While their role seems banal and insignificant, they play a crucial role in accelerating internet speeds by avoiding recursive traffic...

Today, the DNSpooq software has made its way in millions of devices sold worldwide [including] all sorts of networking gear like routers, access points, firewalls, and VPNs from companies like ZTE, Aruba, Redhat, Belden, Ubiquiti, D-Link, Huawei, Linksys, Zyxel, Juniper, Netgear, HPE, IBM, Siemens, Xiaomi, and others. The DNSpooq vulnerabilities, disclosed today by security experts from JSOF, are dangerous because they can be combined to poison DNS cache entries recorded by Dnsmasq servers. Poisoning DNS cache records is a big problem for network administrators because it allows attackers to redirect users to clones of legitimate websites...

In total, seven DNSpooq vulnerabilities have been disclosed today. Four are buffer overflows in the Dnsmasq code that can lead to remote code execution scenarios, while the other three bugs allow DNS cache poisoning. On their own, the danger from each is limited, but researchers argue they can be combined to attack any device with older versions of the Dnsmasq software...

The JSOF exec told ZDNet that his company has worked with both the Dnsmasq project author and multiple industry partners to make sure patches were made available to device vendors by Tuesday's public disclosure.

Honor, the Chinese smartphone brand formerly owned by Huawei, launched the V40, its first device since being sold off. CNBC reports: Huawei sold Honor, its budget smartphone brand, in November to a consortium of buyers in China, as a way to help the unit survive in the face of U.S. sanctions. In 2019, Huawei was put on a U.S. export blacklist called the Entity List which restricted American firms from selling certain components to the Chinese technology giant. This included both semiconductors and software.

Honor's new smartphone is called the V40. It boasts a 6.72-inch display and comes in three colors: silver, black and rose gold. Honor talked up the phone's graphics processing and touchscreen capabilities, features that enhance gaming on the device, a popular use of smartphones in China. It has the ability to connect to next-generation 5G mobile networks, a key requirement in China which is the world's largest market for 5G phones. The V40 uses a key 5G chip from Taiwan's MediaTek, a company which became China's number one smartphone semiconductor supplier in 2020. Honor's V40 starts at 3,599 yuan ($556) for the 128GB storage option and 3,999 yuan for the 256GB version. It will be released in China but it is unclear if it will be launched internationally.

"The Trump administration notified Huawei suppliers, including chipmaker Intel, that it is revoking certain licenses to sell to the Chinese company and intends to reject dozens of other applications," Reuters reports, citing sources familiar with the matter: One of the sources said eight licenses were yanked from four companies. Japanese flash memory chip maker Kioxia Corp had at least one license revoked, two of the sources said. The company, formerly known as Toshiba Memory Corp, could not immediately be reached for comment... Companies that received the "intent to deny" notices have 20 days to respond, and the Commerce Department has 45 days to advise the companies of any change in a decision or it then becomes final. Companies would then have another 45 days to appeal...

Before the latest action, some 150 licenses were pending for $120 billion worth of goods and technology, which had been held up because various U.S. agencies could not agree on whether they should be granted, a person familiar with the matter said. Another $280 billion of licenses for goods and technology for Huawei still have not been dealt with, the source said, but now face a higher likelihood of denial... The United States made the latest decisions during a half dozen meetings starting on Jan. 4 with senior officials from the departments of Commerce, State, Defense and Energy, the source said. The officials developed detailed guidance with regard to which technologies were capable of 5G, and then applied that standard, the person said.

By doing that, the officials denied the vast majority of the roughly 150 disputed applications, and revoked the eight licenses to make those consistent with the new denials, the source said.

Xiaomi plunged a record 10% after the Trump administration blacklisted China's No. 2 smartphone maker and 10 other companies, broadening efforts to undercut the expansion of the country's technology sector. From a report, shared by dxxt: The U.S. has targeted scores of Chinese companies for the stated purpose of protecting national security, but going after Xiaomi was unexpected. The Beijing-based company has been viewed as China's answer to Apple, producing sleek smartphones that draw loyal fans with each new release. The company, which vies with Huawei Technologies for the title of China's No. 1 mobile device brand, also makes electric scooters, earphones and smart rice cookers. The U.S. Defense Dept. identified Xiaomi as one of nine companies with alleged ties to the Chinese military -- which means American investors will be prohibited from buying their securities and will have to divest holdings by November.

MediaTek became the biggest smartphone chipset vendor with 31% market share in the third quarter of 2020, when smartphone sales rebounded during the quarter, according to Counterpoint Research. From a report: MediaTek's strong performance in the US$100-250 price band and growth in key regions like China and India helped it become the biggest smartphone chipset vendor during the third quarter, said Counterpoint. Qualcomm was the biggest 5G chipset vendor in the third quarter of 2020, powering 39% of the 5G phones sold worldwide, Counterpoint indicated. Meanwhile, sales of 5G smartphones doubled during the quarter, accounting for 17% of all smartphones sold.

With Apple launching its 5G lineup, 5G smartphone sales will continue to rise in the fourth quarter of 2020, Counterpoint noted. An estimated one-third of all smartphones shipped will be 5G-enabled, Counterpoint said. "The share of MediaTek chipsets in Xiaomi has increased by more than three times since the same period last year," said Counterpoint research director Dale Gai. "MediaTek was also able to leverage the gap created due to the US ban on Huawei. Affordable MediaTek chips fabricated by TSMC became the first option for many OEMs to quickly fill the gap left by Huawei's absence. Huawei had also previously purchased a significant amount of chipsets ahead of the ban."

After months of deliberation, congressional leaders reached a $900 billion coronavirus relief deal on Sunday, including billions in funding for broadband internet access. From a report: Congress' latest relief measure provides $7 billion in funding for broadband connectivity and infrastructure. That figure includes $3.2 billion for a $50-per-month emergency broadband benefit for people who are laid off or furloughed during the pandemic, according to a press release from Sen. Ron Wyden's (D-OR) office on Sunday. "Broadband connections are essential for Americans seeking to get new jobs, and to access school, health care and other government services," Wyden said in a statement Sunday night. "Ensuring working families can stay online will pay massive dividends for kids' education, helping people find jobs and jump starting the economic recovery next year."

Makers of cars and electronic devices from TVs to smartphones are sounding alarm bells about a global shortage of chips, which is causing manufacturing delays as consumer demand bounces back from the coronavirus crisis. From a report: The problem has several causes, industry executives and analysts say, including bulk-buying by U.S. sanctions-hit Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies, a fire at a chip plant in Japan, coronavirus lockdowns in Southeast Asia, and a strike in France. More fundamentally, however, there has been under-investment in 8-inch chip manufacturing plants owned mostly by Asian firms, which means they have struggled to ramp up production as demand for 5G phones, laptops and cars picked up faster than expected. "For the whole electronics industry, we've been experiencing a shortage of components," said Donny Zhang, CEO of Shenzhen-based sourcing company Sand and Wave, who said he faced delays in obtaining a microcontroller unit that was key to a smart headphone product he was working on. "We were originally planning to complete production in one month, but now it looks like we'll need to do it in two." A source at a Japanese electronics component supplier said it was seeing shortages of WiFi and Bluetooth chips and was expecting delays of more than 10 weeks.

The Federal Communication Commission ordered carriers to remove network equipment that poses a security risk, taking another step aimed at China's Huawei and ZTE. From a report: The agency in a 5-0 vote also said it would establish a list of proscribed equipment, and it set up a program to reimburse carriers for replacing suspect gear that will start once Congress devotes an estimated $1.6 billion. The agency said the actions, which affect providers that take federal subsidies, implement a law Congress passed in March. The FCC, Congress and President Donald Trump's administration are confronting China on a range of issues including trade and the novel coronavirus. The FCC accuses Huawei and ZTE of posing a risk of espionage, an allegation each denies. Last year the agency said subsidies can't be used to buy gear from Huawei or ZTE.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBC.ca: The U.S. Justice Department is talking to representatives of Meng Wanzhou about a potential deal that would allow the Chinese telecom executive to return home from Canada in exchange for signing a deferred prosecution agreement admitting criminal wrongdoing, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Meng, the chief financial officer of Huawei Technologies Co., was detained in December 2018 while she was changing planes in Vancouver. She was arrested on a U.S. extradition request over allegations she lied to a Hong Kong banker in August 2013 about Huawei's control of a subsidiary that's accused of violating U.S. sanctions against Iran. She has consistently denied the charges against her.

Shortly after that arrest, Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor were detained in China, where they remain in detention and face charges of spying for Canada. The report also says the proposed deal could pave the way for China to return Kovrig and Spavor, which is a factor that is in part motivating the discussions, according to the paper's sources. In a report in the Wall Street Journal -- which CBC had not independently verified -- sources say the agreement with Meng would require her to admit to criminal wrongdoing. The newspaper reports that if she does that, U.S. prosecutors would defer the charges against her, and could even drop them at a later date.

Britain will spend $333 million to diversify its sources of 5G wireless equipment after banning China's Huawei from supplying the next-generation technology. From a report: Huawei is set to be excluded from British 5G networks by 2027 due to security concerns, leaving phone carriers reliant on a supply duopoly of Finland's Nokia and Sweden's Ericsson. Around $67 million of the total will be spent next year to help build "a secure and resilient 5G network" according to documents published on Wednesday as part of Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak's spending review. The resulting reduction in competition could hurt security and push up prices, so Digital Secretary Oliver Dowden has started a task force to increase the number of suppliers. He is set to publish more details before the end of the year.

Britain's crackdown on Huawei came in July after UK officials said US sanctions made it impossible to verify the security of Huawei's supply chain. The White House accuses Huawei of being a security risk, which the company has always denied. Since then, Nokia and Ericsson have already won major contracts from British carriers like BT Group and CK Hutchison Holdings' Three UK. The phone industry is banking that longer-term initiatives such as OpenRAN -- a project to make mobile network equipment more interoperable and encourage new suppliers -- will eventually introduce more competition.