US Investigates Into Huawei Following Accusations Of Trade Secret Theft

Dhir Acharya - Jan 18, 2019

US prosecutors have been conducting an investigation into Huawei after accusations against the company over trade secret theft.

There have been accusations against Huawei, saying that it steals trade secrets from companies in the US, and now federal prosecutors will investigate into the Chinese company.

On Wednesday, Wall Street reported the issue. Accordingly, the allegedly stolen data include the technology used in a robotic device for testing smartphones at T-Mobile. Reliable sources said the investigation has come to its advanced stage with an indictment soon to be released.

Huawei refused to comment on the news, and the Justice Department hasn’t responded to a request for comment.

Reports say that the accusations are related to a lawsuit between Huawei and T-Mobile back in 2014. In 2017, as stated by FierceWireless, it was ruled that Huawei stole trade secrets from T-Mobile and awarded T-Mobile with 4.8 million. However, the jury believed the misappropriation was not as deliberate and severe as reported by T-Mobile.

Now it’s a tense time to carry out the investigation due to recent events between the US and China’s Huawei. In December 2018, Meng Wanzhou – Huawei’s CFO and Huawei’s founder’s daughter – was arrested in Canada and faced extradition to the United States following accusations of violating Iran sanctions.

Meng Wanzhou was arrested in 2018

Additionally, Huawei’s sales director for public-sector in Poland earlier this month was arrested in the country due to accusations of spying for China. The arrest involved a former Polish security agent that worked for Orange Polska – a French telecom’s branch in Poland. The pair was Weijing W. and Piotr D., and after the arrest, Huawei fired this sales director.

Huawei is the world second largest smartphone manufacturer, who has been struggling to maintain its market in the US. The US government has repeatedly warned against Huawei’s devices’ security as well as advised its officials not to use the company’s phones. In March, Best Buy – the giant US-based electronics retailer, said it would stop selling all products from the company.