Shoddy US government review of Chinese telcos endangered national security, Senate panel finds

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

https://www.cyberscoop.com/chinese-telecommunications-national-security-team-telecom-senate/

By Shannon Vavra
CYBERSCOOP
June 9, 2020

For decades, the U.S. government’s process for reviewing the cybersecurity 
risks of Chinese telecommunications companies operating in the U.S. has been so 
haphazard that it has “endangered our national security,” a bipartisan Senate 
review released Tuesday found.

The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said that the group 
responsible for these kinds of reviews, made up of national security officials 
from the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and Justice, largely failed 
to rein in Chinese telecommunications companies because of an “informal” 
process, insufficient resourcing, and a lack of statutory authority.

Federal Communications Commission commissioners have likened the group’s review 
to an “inextricable black hole,” the report said.

As a result of minimal oversight from the group, known as “Team Telecom,” 
Chinese state-owned telecommunications companies have been able to operate with 
relative impunity, even as concerns have mounted that Chinese state-owned 
companies could be enabling espionage backed by the Chinese government within 
the U.S.

[...]

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