Best Buy Stops Selling Huawei Smartphones (cnet.com) 88
Best Buy, the nation's largest electronics big box retailer, has ceased ordering new smartphones from Huawei and will stop selling its products over the next few weeks. Best Buy didn't provide any details as to why it has severed ties with Huawei, but it may have to do with security concerns involving the Chinese government. CNET reports: The move is a critical blow to Huawei, which is the world's third-largest smartphone vendor behind Apple and Samsung but has struggled to establish any presence in the U.S. Best Buy was one of Huawei's biggest retail partners, and one of the rare places where you could physically see its phones. Huawei phones aren't sold by any U.S. carriers, where a majority of Americans typically buy their phones. Security concerns have long dogged Huawei in the U.S. In 2012, the House Intelligence Committee released a report accusing Huawei and fellow Chinese vendor ZTE of making telecommunications equipment that posed national security threats, and banned U.S. companies from buying the gear. At the time, the committee stressed that the report didn't refer to its smartphones. But that's changed over the last several months. The directors of the FBI, CIA and NSA all expressed their concerns about the risks posed by Huawei and ZTE.
Re:They should (Score:5, Insightful)
They should stop selling all phones because they all are made in China or have Chinese parts
Or perhaps instead of "expressing concerns" the FBI, CIA, and NSA should be asked to provide some actual evidence.
Re: They should (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: They should (Score:5, Insightful)
These 3 agencies have a combined budget of over $60B. When expressing their opinion on a cellphone, they should be able to offer something more than just gut feelings.
Don't buy Huawei, buy CIA ! (Score:1)
Obviously the CIA-brand phone is much more better than that from the chicom Huawei !
MAGA !!
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They can't, because doing so would endanger the software included in the next Shadow Brokers leak prior to it being leaked, remember?
For me it is the opposite. (Score:5, Insightful)
A foreign country has a whole lot less power over me than an agency in "my" own country!
In China, I'd buy an NSA phone (Aka Google/Apple/MS/etc,incliding Japanese/EU brands),
But in the US I sure as hell will buy a Chinese phone. Or a Russian one.
Always preferably not via mail order, but by traveling there.
To buy a US phone in the US, or Chinese phone in China requires the worst kind of anticonspiracy theorist / blackeyed syndrome.
Interestingly, I learned this strategy from the NSA itself (thanks Snowden!): When two enemies quarrel, rejoice!
(The German faity tale The Valiant Little Tailor teaches how to get two giants to fight, to win against them both.)
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That is a good point. Buy implements that have spying tools that will spy on your for someone who has minimal impact on your life and is likely to block or at least hinder attempts to spy on your by those with most impact on your life.
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Reality is, they pretty much snag you on the first personalised update and if you cross borders and allow them to take your phone from your sight, you can pretty much guarantee it comes back with added software that you would need to root the phone to get out. On you very first update out of the US, they will hack you unless, it is an anonymous update. You can always fight back by adding fantasy into your digital life, they want to bullshit you, remember to bullshit the internet back.
Re:For me it is the opposite. (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not so much concerned about snooping as I am having my device potentially used as a tool in an enemy power's cyber warfare campaign against my own nation.
Re:For me it is the opposite. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not so much concerned about snooping as I am having my device potentially used as a tool in an enemy power's cyber warfare campaign against my own nation.
OK. That's a legitimate stance. However, think about it more deeply.
What does China care about the most? It's own economic development. How does it achieve that development? By exporting tons of stuff all over the planet.
Now think what would happen if China were to all of a sudden cyber-weaponize every smartphone in a country...and cause some serious damage - it doesn't have to be the US, it can be a small country, say Denmark or Singapore. What would be the result? Everyone (and not just in the affected country, but pretty much everywhere) would ditch their Chinese-made smartphones, never buy them again, and probably start dumping all of their Chinese-made electronics...this would be a disaster - for China primarily. How likely then is China to do such a thing? Highly unlikely.
So, would you want Chinese-made telecom equipment in CIA headquarters or the White House? Surely not. Do you want CEOs of large American companies using Chinese phones for confidential conversations? Probably not. Does it however matter if the average Jane or Joe on the street is using them? It doesn't.
Sure China might've installed a backdoor in every smartphone that could potentially wreak planetary havoc. However if they ever get around to using it, that would mean that the world situation is so bad that you would have a lot of other things to worry about before thinking of your smartphone.
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"What does China care about the most? It's own economic development. How does it achieve that development? By exporting tons of stuff all over the planet."
China is a mostly benevolent dictatorship. Although the current regime is focused on the benefit of the country through economic development, it is unstable and at lower levels of government, a very corrupt system. Their motives are not always so clear and not always to the benefit of wider society, but to the benefit of the people in power.
Dictatorship
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I mostly agree with your points, but don't doubt that China can do profoundly stupid things very quickly.
I agree, but we have also seen democratic states do stupid things very quickly. If you look over the past few decades, you will see that in fact China has been more stable in that regard. That doesn't mean things can't go belly up of course.
Naturally, the best would be to be sure that are no backdoors of any kind in any consumer electronic products, belonging to no state or organization.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
but I trust the Chinese government a whole lot less.
Why? What is your opinion based on? You don't live in China. Do you think the Chinese government really cares what you are doing?
Consider, in China, the Government controls just about everything, but, they don't pretend otherwise. The people in China know they are watching and they also know that unless you are plotting against the Government or doing illegal stuff that they don't really give a shit.
In the US, they do the same exact stuff, but just lie about it and tell everyone they are not doing that, all
Re: They should (Score:4, Informative)
The people in China know they are watching and they also know that unless you are plotting against the Government or doing illegal stuff that they don't really give a shit.
For values of "plotting against the Government" that amount to "establishing any kind of movement or organization that is threatening their undisputed power or rallies protests or tries to promote change", sure. You don't need to dress up as Guy Fawkes and try blowing up parliament to be "plotting", you won't be seeing any hippies protesting on the White House lawn in China. You won't be seeing the Falun Gong or protest signs saying "Free Tibet" or "Remember Tiananmen Square", if you're critical of the government in any way you're silenced. The US may be just as bad as China when it comes to spying, but they're cracking down much harder on dissent.
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Assange is just a russian asset now, as you can see from his behaviour around the hacked emails in 2016.
Wikileaks could have been a positive force in the world, but that smarmy cunt pissed all over it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The US government is just as shitty as China's,.
Um, no, it's actually, very objectively not.
For just one blindingly obvious example, you can trash Trump 24/7 and not go to jail. Try that in China.
Re: They should (Score:5, Funny)
For just one blindingly obvious example, you can trash Trump 24/7 and not go to jail. Try that in China.
I've been to China several times and I'm pretty sure you could trash Trump 24x7 over there and not go to jail.
Re: They should (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Having actually BEEN to China, I have to concur. In the US, you can use nearly any search engine, nearly any email provider, and you have access to essentially the entire public-facing internet. In China, not so much.
Re: (Score:2)
but I trust the Chinese government a whole lot less
With what? Trust is not a blanket statement. You compare it to the TLAs and in that regard I trust the Chinese government who openly admit to pretty much everything they do more than the TLAs who pretend not to do it at best, and at worst actively drop cases when it looks like a legal process may force discovery on what they are doing.
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Re: (Score:2)
You do have to remember that things like logic rarely have a lot to do with such decisions.
Basically, yes, controlling the telecom equipment is indeed more dangerous than actual phones as each such thing impacts large number of users and a single smartphone much less.
But basically most smartphones are very un-secure devices where no one really knows what all software modules are in them.
Always an enemy (Score:4, Interesting)
It is really shocking how badly Americans always need an enemy to fight. Even when there is no enemy, one will be created or invented.
What would you do for $60B? (Score:1)
If there was no enemy, the FBI/CIA/NSA would have their budgets cut.
So they just invent a new enemy of they run out of enemies.
no enemy ? (Score:2)
What's that now? The world is a good place and unicorns fart rainbows ?
Re: (Score:1)
When was there ever no enemy ? Ever ?
Spoken like a true American.
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Hmmmmm........I see Best Buy still has many pages on Facebook!!! Collusion!!!
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well why stop at china.
samsung has backdoors(effectively) for all samsung phones.
lenovo has the same for all lenovo phones.
motorola same.
vivo same.
apple same.
even nokia same with the new phones.
what I don't get, is why would they buy phones from another line at foxconn and not the other. this best buy thing must be just them lining up a deal with some another brand.
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>The worst thing Samsung will do is turn your porn into K-Pop videos.
But think of the mental health issues, that would surely overwhelm the entire medical system of the nation.
Nexus 6P and the coming global trade war (Score:2)
I still use my trusty 6P and it's still doing everything I need it to do. It has Android 8.1, though I guess that is the last OS update. Still, way better than what Samsung gave me, which is why I no longer buy their phones.
What is amazing is the fact that Huawei controls the vast amount of the cellulars infrastructure around the world. For one type of certification, a phone needs to do field trial certifications on 5 different network configurations. It's getting harder and hard to find 5 configs that are
Re: (Score:2)
The Chinese branded phones I'd consider buying on price are Motorola or Xiaomi. Both have models featuring more or less standard off the shelf Snapdragon parts, as found in mainstream brands such as Pixel, LG or Samsung.
Don't use the Chinese ROM but flash your own LineageOS image and look maybe there's something lurking in the bootloader but more than likely they're just another OEM doing minimal customization of whatever Google and Qualcomm throw over the wall. (Yes, I *am* completely naive about cyberhack
Re: (Score:2)
My latest phone purchases were two Huawei-based phones, and for simple reasons. Let's compare:
1) Apple is a non-starter because of their walled garden and massively high price bullshit, so I will never buy an Apple product until they change their business practices and dramatically lower their prices.
2) Samsung is overpriced and underperforming. All of their products also come stocked with oodles of bloatware that can't be removed. Samsung has followed the trend of removing the headphone jack and SD card
Re: (Score:2)
2) Samsung is overpriced and underperforming. All of their products also come stocked with oodles of bloatware that can't be removed. Samsung has followed the trend of removing the headphone jack and SD card slot.
Sorry what? Their latest flagship is priced at just over 700 dollars. The pixel 2 XL started at 850, the iPhone X over 1000. Everyone expected it to be more, but it's pretty reasonable actually. You can easily mod (remove bloat from) the Exynos versions of the galaxy phones that are sold most everywhere throughout the world. The snapdragon variants for the US are locked down due to carrier agreements. Samsung has definitely not followed the trend of removing the headphone jack and SD slot. Not sure where yo
Re: (Score:1)
You're comparing the base model (GS9) with the premium models of the other two (Pixel 2 XL, iPhone X). A more accurate comparison would have been the GS9+, which starts at $840, or compare to the iPhone 8 and the Pixel 2 (non-XL).
Re:Oppo/OnePlus also banned list (Score:5, Informative)
BBK Electronics [wikipedia.org]
Markets smartphones under the Oppo, Vivo and OnePlus brands.
Unlike Oppo and Vivo, OnePlus is sold in most markets and was found to have preloaded spyware on numerous occasions. [androidpolice.com]
Re: (Score:2)
The possibility smart nations tracking US experts and contractors globally using their consumer products.
What the NSA and GCHQ had to work for decades and needed billions to put in place, other nations just sell to US officers and contractors as part of their wage.
Voice print, GPS, home network, wondering around on a base, junk crypto. Some other nation is getting a NSA collecting network for free.
The only way the
Why not just all Chinese-made phones? (Score:2)
Does anyone think that the company ownership matters if the Chinese government wants to compromise the software going into cell phones manufactured in China?
For the most part if you're looking at smartphones they're manufactured in one of three countries (four depending on how you feel about Taiwan). Many are in mainland China (Lenovo/Motorola, Huawei, TCL as Alcatel, ZTE), including ones that are outsourced to Foxconn (Apple, Nokia/HMD, probably others) or other
One less reason to go to Best Buy (Score:2)
The last time I was in a Best Buy was to buy my current Huawei Honor 8, 2 years ago. They won my business over Amazon (I have Prime) and Ebay by the fact that the color I wanted was in stock locally. It still took the sales associate over 1 hour to find time for me and to search there stock 3 times to finally find my phone. Before that I hadn't been in a Best Buy in over 5 years (looking for a computer component they apparently no longer sold at that time).
And here I thought the US was a capitalist country.
Contrarian (Score:2)
almost like (Score:1)
That's just bad news.. (Score:2)
The Chinese have proven they can make a smartphone with large 1080p screen, good build quality and camera, adequate performance and then sell it for 200-250USD (Honor 5x,6x,7x, Moto G5 Plus, etc). I got an Honor 6X at Best Buy and I don't know why one needs an 800 phone when the 6X basically runs the same apps and performs with good fluidity under most usage scenarios (the only issue that does with performance is that camera UI can be laggy or stutter).
Too bad Best Buy will be dropping this brand. I can ass