The 5G War between China, Huawei and the U.S.A

Chinese tech giant Huawei has been all over the news lately. The company — which is the second biggest smartphone seller in the world (ahead of Apple and second only to Samsung) — has been the target of new restrictions on its business by the Trump administration. But what exactly did Huawei do and why is the US government worried about it? We will try to break it down in this article.

For nearly a decade, the US government has suspected that Huawei could be using its technologies to spy on behalf of the Chinese government. This suspicion rose to astronomical levels when news that Huawei is 18 months ahead of its US competitors in the release of 5G surfaced. This led the Trump Administration to issue an executive order banning US companies from using information and communications technology from anyone considered a national security threat and declared a national emergency on the matter. The move was widely viewed as being aimed at Huawei. The same day, the Commerce Department placed Huawei and 70 of its affiliates on its “Entity List,” which is basically a trade blacklist that bars anyone on it from buying parts and components from US companies without the government’s approval first.

So what exactly is 5G and why is it brewing a trade war?

You may think it's a faster version of 4G, but it's a lot more. 5G is so fast that the world could be changed. The new world of 5G technology promises to transform our lives. 5G lightning fast technology will accelerate and interconnect "EVERYTHING" up to 20 times faster than the 4G most of us use now. For instance, downloading a 2-hour 3G movie might take up to 26 hours, while you will have to wait about 6 minutes on 4G, and downloading your movie in just over 3.5 seconds on 5G. It is not only internet capacity that will be upgraded; it will also improve response time. 4G responds in 0.045 milliseconds to our commands, but with 5G, it will take about 1 millisecond which is 400 times faster than the blink of the eye. 5G is not just about downloading speed; it's all about changing the game. You could have cities with 5G where everything communicates; doctors can perform surgery from the other side of the world.

When the US won the 4G race earlier this decade, it boosted gross domestic product by nearly $100 billion and the stakes of the 5G race are even higher. If the US wins, it would create an estimated 3 million jobs and add approximately $500 billion to its GDP.

Also, 5G is not just about money and internet speed, it’s also about power because if you control 5G, you have access to everything people do online and right now Huawei owns the best and most advanced 5G technology.

Huawei may be best known for making phones but it’s also a leading player for building infrastructure for all our communications. Critics fear that allowing Huawei to build 5G could enable the Chinese government to spy on or even switch off the flow of data we all depend on.

Subsequently, a number of US firms have begun to back away from their business with Huawei. Google has started to limit the Android services it provides to the company, a maneuver that could be hugely detrimental to Huawei’s smartphone business. Chipmakers Intel, Qualcomm, and Broadcom have said they’re not supplying Huawei as well, according to Bloomberg.

On Monday, the Commerce Department eased up a bit and said that for 90 days, it would issue limited exemptions in an effort to minimize disruptions for some ongoing business. Namely, the department will allow Huawei to buy US-made goods in order to maintain existing telecommunications networks and provide software updates to its existing mobile phones. That could slow Google’s actions on Android and Huawei phones.

In reaction, Chinese people around the world have been filming themselves smashing their "I phones" (a product of American business, Apple) with businesses in China offering certain rewards to their employees if they destroy their I phone and purchase a Huawei phone. One of such rewards is a percentage rise in their wages.

Although no concrete evidence has been found to prove that Huawei will be spying on everyone when they launch the 5G, the United States is still worried about what Huawei could potentially enable the Chinese government to do hence the action taken against Huawei.