No Huawei ‘smoking gun’ in Europe, French cybersecurity chief says

France’s cybersecurity chief said his agency has not uncovered any evidence of Huawei Technologies spying via Europe’s telecommunications networks, shrugging off US and German concerns.

Guillaume Poupard, the head of the national cybersecurity agency ANSSI, spoke following reports of a US document transmitted to Germany, citing evidence of Huawei spying through its equipment.

“There is no Huawei smoking gun as of today in Europe,” Poupard said in an interview with Bloomberg News. “There is no situation with Huawei being caught massively spying in Europe. Elsewhere maybe it’s different, but not in Europe.”

Intelligence agencies and companies have been warning about the dangers of equipment from Huawei, the world’s largest telecoms equipment supplier, for nearly a decade.

Shenzhen-based Huawei has repeatedly denied that its products posed any kind of security threat. The US government has recently put pressure on its allies to avoid using the Chinese technology giant’s equipment in their 5G infrastructure.

Poupard acknowledged that Huawei may have held discussions with the Chinese state, but said Chinese national security laws require all domestic organisations to cooperate with the national intelligence service.

“The fact that Huawei discusses with the Chinese state, it’s normal,” he said. “It’s a Chinese company, and the law forces them to. It’s no use reproaching them for that; we just have to include that as an existing setting.”