While Vodafone and Huawei say the issues were fixed, sources say vulnerabilities remained beyond 2012
For months, Huawei Technologies Co. has faced U.S. allegations that it flouted sanctions on Iran, attempted to steal trade secrets from a business partner and has threatened to enable Chinese spying through the telecom networks it’s built across the West.
A backdoor, in cybersecurity terms, is a method of bypassing security controls to access a computer system or encrypted data. While backdoors can be common in some network equipment and software because developers create them to manage the gear, they can be exploited by attackers. In Vodafone’s case, the risks included possible third-party access to a customer’s personal computer and home network, according to the internal documents.
In a statement to Bloomberg, Vodafone said it found vulnerabilities with the routers in Italy in 2011 and worked with Huawei to resolve the issues that year. There was no evidence of any data being compromised, it said. The carrier also identified vulnerabilities with the Huawei-supplied broadband network gateways in Italy in 2012 and said those were resolved the same year.
While backdoors are common in home routers, they are usually fixed by manufacturers once disclosed, said Eric Evenchick, Principal Research Consultant at Atredis Partners, a U.S. based cybersecurity firm. Evenchick called the situation with Huawei’s equipment “very concerning.” In January 2011, Vodafone Italy started a deeper probe of the routers, according to an April report from the year. Security testing by an independent contractor identified the telnet backdoor as the greatest concern, posing risks including giving unauthorized access to Vodafone’s broader Wide Area Network . Vodafone noted that it’s an industry practice by some router manufacturers to use a telnet service to manage their equipment, but the company said it didn’t allow this.
Huawei’s apparent reluctance only amplified concerns that were circulating even then that the company might pose a security threat to customers.
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