Security News > 2021 > August > Huawei stole our tech and created a 'backdoor' to spy on Pakistan, claims IT biz

A California-based IT consultancy has sued Huawei and its subsidiary in Pakistan alleging the Chinese telecom firm stole its trade secrets and failed to honor a contract to develop technology for Pakistani authorities.

The complaint [PDF], filed on Wednesday in the US District Court in Santa Ana, California, describes how Business Efficiency Solutions, LLC, began working with Huawei Technologies in 2016 to overhaul the IT systems available to the Punjab Police Integrated Command, Control and Communication Center of Lahore, capital of the Punjab province of Pakistan.

The legal filing claims, among other things, that Huawei has used BES's Data Exchange System "To create a backdoor and obtain data important to Pakistan's national security and to spy on Pakistani citizens."

Huawei also began to use one of BES's software systems to establish a 'backdoor' from China into Pakistan that allowed Huawei to collect and view data important to Pakistan's national security and other private, personal data on Pakistani citizens.

"After Huawei had BES's valuable trade secrets and other intellectual property in its possession, Huawei used its knowledge of BES's technology to begin secretly procuring certain portions of BES's software systems from other sources - including from vendors BES identified to Huawei," the complaint says.

The BES lawsuit cites a past instance, described in an April 8, 2019 BBC report, in which the PSCA told Huawei to remove Wi-Fi cards from a CCTV system in Pakistan because the cards had been set up to provide remote diagnostic information - which a Huawei representative at the time characterized as "a misunderstanding" and the BES complaint describes as a "Covert backdoor to monitor Pakistan citizens using Wi-Fi chips."

News URL

https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2021/08/13/huawei_accused_of_trade_secret/