US Accuses Huawei of Stealing Tech, Helping Iran in New Indictment

Huawei says US trying to damage the company's reputation

Continuing the Trump Administration’s campaign against China’s Huawei Technologies, US prosecutors issued a new indictment of the company accusing them of a series of charges, including stealing technologies and helping Iran identify protesters in 2009.

The indictment named six US companies, claiming Huawei conspired to steal trade secrets from them, in violation of a racketeering act. They further claimed Huawei provided technology to Iran to monitor protesters in 2009, and were responsible for Iran arresting some of them.

Huawei has been targeted by the US because it provides 5G technology, and the administration has argued that nations that use that technology are at risk of espionage. Since the US used cellular technology for espionage for years, they envision that as an inevitable consequernce.

Huawei officials dismissed the indictment as an attempt to further damage the company’s reputation after months of US lobbying. They said the racketeering allegations were civil allegations that were nearly 20 years old.

Indeed, one of the main trade secrets was from 2000, when the company gained access to source code for Internet routers. They used this to sell their own routers in the US as a lower cost version.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.