Finland passes law banning telecoms gear for security reasons

Finland’s parliament has approved a law allowing authorities to ban particular telecom network equipment where there is sufficient cause for concern around the use of devices with regards to national security or defense. Finland has not banned any vendor based on source country as did Sweden whose 5G spectrum auctions await the outcome of court cases due to its regulator’s decision to ban Chinese companies in October. 

Huawei is centre stage to a fight between China and the United States, with Washington accusing Huawei’s 5G technology of being leveraged as a spy backdoor for the Chinese government which Huawei has denied. This new Finnish law which can be applied retroactively, applies regulation only to the critical network parts handling network traffic flow. The government has committed to paying compensation in cases where equipment is ordered to be removed.