Former CIA and NSA director Gen. Michael Hayden told the Australian Financial Review that telecommunications manufacturer Huawei Technologies has spied for the Chinese government and presents a substantial security threat to Australia and the United States.
Hayden said Western intelligence agencies have concluded that Huawei "shared with the Chinese state intimate and extensive knowledge of the foreign telecommunications systems it is involved with."
The company’s global cyber security officer denied Hayden’s allegations of spying and cited the lack of public evidence provided by critics.
The Financial Review reported in March 2012 that Huawei was banned from helping build Australia’s national broadband network on the advice of security agencies.
Although the company is attempting to restore credibility in Australia, Hayden said the country should remain vigilant in its dealings with Huawei:
General Hayden said that given the "over-arching national security risks a foreign company building your national telecoms networks creates, the burden of proof is on Huawei."
Huawei has fallen "well short" of meeting the test, he said.
"These guys are not even transparent to themselves," he said. "There’s no transparency around who appoints the board or who controls the ownership of the business.
"And there’s no independent Chinese government oversight committee that could give us confidence that Huawei would not do what they promised not to do."
Hayden was approached to become a member of Huawei’s American board but declined because, "God did not make enough slides on Huawei to convince me that having them involved in our critical communications infrastructure was going to be OK," he said.
Additionally, Huawei Australia’s chairman also confirmed last year that the company was a network provider to Iran.