The FCC is investigating whether Huawei, other Chinese companies are evading US ban

The US Federal Communications Commission has launched what it describes as a “sweeping investigation” on Chinese companies already on its “Covered List.” Those companies include Huawei, ZTE and China Telecom, which the US government believes are aligned with the Chinese Communist Party. In 2022, the Biden administration banned the sale of communications equipment, video surveillance gear and services from those companies in an effort to protect the country’s national security and ensure that “untrustworthy communications equipment is not authorized for use within [US] borders.”

According to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, the agency has reason to believe that some of the entities in the Covered List are still operating in the US, because they don’t think the ban covers “particular types of operations or otherwise.” These companies are “trying to make an end run around those FCC prohibitions by continuing to do business in America on a private or ‘unregulated’ basis,” he said.

This investigation is the first major initiative under the Council for National Security that Carr recently established within the FCC. The new council’s main purposes is to reduce American technology and telecommunications sectors’ reliance on foreign adversaries, mitigate the country’s vulnerability to cyberattacks and espionage, as well as to ensure that the US “wins the strategic competition with China over critical technologies.”

The FCC intends to gather a wide range of information on entities in the Covered List, including details about their ongoing business in the US and the business of companies that may be aiding their operations. It said it will “close any loopholes that have permitted untrustworthy, foreign adversary state-backed actors to skirt [its] rules.”