Huawei seeks unified approach to cybersecurity

Huawei Technologies has called for a unified approach to cybersecurity based on facts, rather than suspicion and misconceptions.

The tech giant made the call at the opening of its largest ‘Global Cyber Security and Privacy Protection Transparency Centre’ in Dongguan, China, according to a statement to Financial Street on Wednesday.

At the launch were representatives of the GSM Association, SUSE Linux, British Standards Institution, as well as regulators from the United Arab Emirates and Indonesia.

“While we are deepening digitalisation across the world, cybersecurity is becoming more important than ever before,” Huawei’s Rotating Chairman, Dr Ken Hu, said.

According to a research from Cybersecurity Ventures, damages from cybercrime are set to reach $6tn in 2021, Hu noted, warning that with the increasing number of time people spend online as a result of the Coronavirus Disease, the world is fast facing deeper cybersecurity challenges than at any other time in its history.

To address the challenges, he said a unified and collaborative approach between corporations, nation states, regulators, and industry bodies was required.

“Cybersecurity is a complex, evolving challenge that requires collaboration. In some places, there is still a misconception that country of origin affects network security. This is not true and prevents us from taking a unified approach to cybersecurity,” Hu stressed.

The new transparency centre aims to change that and help facilitate collaboration across the ecosystem, he noted.

According to him, Huawei employs more than 3,000 cybersecurity professionals and spends five per cent of its Research and Development budget on cybersecurity.

Hu added, “At Huawei, cybersecurity is our top priority. The new centre will demonstrate solutions, facilitate communication and joint innovation, as well as support stakeholders around the world.”

The event was also used to launch the company’s Product Security Baseline Whitepaper, which sets out the end-to-end framework Huawei uses when it develops, tests and launches products to ensure that they are as secure as possible.

Huawei hopes to foster a spirit of collaboration and transparency, the Director of Global Cyber Security and Privacy Protection Office, Sean Yang, said.

“The baselines outlined in the whitepaper ensure that all Huawei products keep to regulatory standards.

“We want to share knowledge with all stakeholders, to help ensure that end users are kept secure while having their privacy protected,” Yang added.

The Chief Security Officer, Huawei Technologies, United States of America, Andy Purdy, said, “The value that technology can bring requires a shared responsibility. That means collaboration, not just in standards but also when it comes to sharing information about practices and improving procurement requirements. If we don’t have accountability for requirements, people are going to think you don’t care about them.”

Also, the General Manager of Information Security Architecture and Technical Excellence, MTN, Professor Ernest Ngassam, said, “It is really difficult to implement a cybersecurity defence strategy in a vacuum. The supply chain needs to be transparent, to enable customers to take action sooner rather than later.”

Huawei’s Global Cyber Security and Privacy Officer, John Suffolk, pointed out that the rapid pace of technological evolution means that standards could only take you so far.

“We need to recognise that in a real-time world that standards are important, but they’re not your saviour. You need to make sure that your products and solutions are going through continuous assessment.

“At Huawei, we take a ‘many eyes and many hands’ approach to security. The more people look at something and the more people touch it, the better. Transparency and collaboration is, therefore, critical.

“We’re at an inflection point, and if we’re to embrace the promise of the ongoing digital revolution, we all need to work together to ensure everyone works transparently to keep the ecosystem as safe as possible,” Suffolk added.