Huawei proposes Australian cyber security centre
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Huawei proposes Australian cyber security centre

China’s Huawei has reportedly pledged to become more transparent and is proposing to set up a cyber security centre in Australia to address concerns that it is engaged in espionage.

The vendor was banned from participating in Australia’s $38 billion National Broadband Network (NBN) project earlier this year and has recently been the subject of scrutiny in both the US and the UK.

"Huawei has done a very poor job of communicating about ourselves and we must take full responsibility for that," John Lord, chairman of Huawei Australia, told reporters today according to Reuters.

He also denied that there were any grounds for governments to be afraid of the equipment vendor.

The cyber security centre proposed by Huawei would be similar to the one established in the UK two years ago, giving security officials complete access to Huawei’s software code and equipment.

Huawei has also offered similar scrutiny in the US, where it and fellow Chinese vendor ZTE have so far been blocked from establishing any significant market presence but this proposal was deemed to fall short of addressing security concerns.

Only this week UK Prime Minister, David Cameron, was forced to back Huawei following allegations of espionage in a US Intelligence Committee report and the revelation that the UK government was investigating Huawei’s contract with BT, established in 2004.

The vendor already supplies equipment for two of Australia’s major mobile operators, Optus and Vodafone, while market leader Telstra is also conducting trials with the company.

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