Huawei roots for 5G technology amid growing cyber attacks

NAIROBI -- Chinese technology firm Huawei on Thursday called for increased adoption of 5G technology amid growing cyber-attacks.

Mika Lauhde, Huawei's global vice-president for cybersecurity and privacy, told a virtual meeting that 5G is much more secure than 4G and earlier technologies such as 3G and 2G and comes with other benefits of speed, capacity and latency.

"The 5G standards address risks in 17 security areas making networks and information more secure, protecting user's privacy as well as the integrity of networks through improved security architecture, authentication, key management, radio access network (RAN) security, cryptographic algorithms and much more," Lauhde said during the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) Kenya online conference.

Lauhde said that 5G has different attributes that improve security, particularly that of network slicing, where a network can be adjusted for different users.

"Furthermore algorithms used for encrypting information transmitted on 5G networks are designed so that even quantum computers of the future won't be able to crack them," he added.

He revealed that Huawei is "the most audited and inspected company in the industry and that no other equipment provider has undergone the scrutiny that it has been subjected to".

Lauhde said that Huawei has never had any major security incidents and that the technology firm believes in the importance of standards in cybersecurity, adding that "trust needs to be based on facts, facts need to be verifiable, and verification needs to be based on common standards."