5G & Huawei: An explainer

As the Liberals head back to Parliament following the Oct. 21 federal election, they’ll be returning to a number of key files that were left unaddressed before the writ dropped — including deciding what security approach the government will take with Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. equipment and Canada’s 5G networks. Of course, some things have changed since the House of Commons rose for the summer — not only will the Liberals need the support of another party to pass legislation now that they no longer have a majority, but they also must name a new public safety minister to replace Ralph Goodale, who lost his seat in Regina—Wascana, as the minister in charge of conducting the security review. The Conservatives have previously said they are in favour of an unspecified form of ban, while the NDP has said the decision should be made by national security agencies. The election curve ball comes after the government has already adjusted its timing on when the public can expect the decision many times -- speaking to how complicated the policy determination is. It’s unclear whether the decision will be further delayed as a new minister gets up to speed. The decision of whether or not to ban Huawei from all or part of the upcoming 5G networks is a difficult one, touching on at least three separate, if overlapping, questions: the geopolitical security alignment of Canada, the dollars-and-cents ambitions of some of Canada’s largest companies, and the technical challenges and global supply chains needed to set up 5G infrastructure. Of these, the third is the topic that has attracted the least analysis from the policy makers and the journalists that cover them, and several questions are apparent. When governments and telecom companies talk about the “sensitive core” and the less-sensitive “non-core” elements of 5G networks, what do they mean? What does the core of the network do, and why have some countries opted to ban Huawei gear from being used on it? (Since 2013, Canada has effectively banned Huawei from the more sensitive parts of its existing 3G, and 4G LTE telecommunications networks under the Canadian Security Establishment’s security review program.) And what would such a ban mean for companies that already use Huawei gear on their networks as they move toward what is being touted as the most significant leap in wireless technology in years? *** It can be difficult to separate the hype from the reality when it comes to 5G, but one thing is clear: 5G will mean much more data at much faster speeds. Recent speed tests by the monitoring group OpenSignal looking at the earliest 5G roll outs in the United States have placed download speeds at over 1,800 Mbps, and some have predicted 5G speeds will eventually be as much as 100 times faster than 4G. The earliest versions of 5G networks -- known as non-standalone networks (NSA) -- will rely on the same radio access network (RAN) architecture as 4G, but add in new computing functions closer to the “edge” of the network, meaning closer to where the user is. In order to carry increased volumes of data, wireless providers will have to put in place new network infrastructure, with new types of equipment like mobile edge computing and small cell base stations that will allow network functions to take place closer to the end user. (More about mobile edge computing in a minute.) In a non-standalone network, elements of the 4G network, like radio antennas and associated support infrastructure like towers and utility poles will remain, but will have software updates. A standalone (SA) 5G network, in which the entire network architecture will be new, isn’t expected anywhere in the world until 2020 at the earliest. Telus told the government in a presentation this February that at this time, “5G standalone network would become a commercial and competitive failure in that the necessary Canadian 5G only spectrum bands may never emerge or several years later than non-standalone 5G built upon 4G commercial standard. Canadians served by this hypothetical standalone network would not have access to 5G devices.’ A recent research note about the state of 5G from National Bank analysts identifies three other technologies in addition to mobile edge computing that are essential to enabling the 5G rollout: carrier aggregation, which will allow a radio to pick up multiple channels simultaneously allowing for increased download speeds; massive multiple-input, multiple output (MIMO) antennas, allowing the transmission of data across multiple antenna at once; and Quadrature Amplitude Modulation, which allows for more data packed into radio waves. The changes in network architecture needed for a standalone network are only performed one every 10 to 15 years, according to Ian Fogg, an analyst with OpenSignal, which tracks 5G network rollouts around the world. “If you put a vendor into that core network, it will be managing all of the network functions for years to come,” Fogg said in a phone interview. Huawei plays different roles in different networks. On Canadian networks -- like those of BCE Inc., Telus Corp. and Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corp. -- Huawei provides the RAN equipment only, but the company also sells equipment for cloud computing functions and data centres in the core in networks in other countries. “The deployment of 5G is not a one time event … This is going to take many, many, many years,” Huawei Canada’s chief technology officer Rob Backhouse said in a phone interview. “I mean it’s not just technology, is it? It’s regulatory, it’s even I guess how people feel with safety and comfort. It’s a journey.” *** While Huawei supplies gear to be used in the RAN of some of Canada’s wireless networks, there is no Huawei gear in the “core” of any of Canada’s networks. The RAN -- which incorporates equipment like antennas and radios -- is classed as “non-core” because it connects mobile devices to the servers (the core) where the actual data processing functions are performed, though the RAN doesn’t process any data itself. With the advent of 5G, the data processing functions of the core will be physically distributed throughout the network through cloud computing, which is the strength of 5G in terms of what the new era of wireless networks will be able to do with reduced latency, but also means the network architecture will be increasingly sensitive. More touchpoints for the data -- whether financial, medical, or personal -- distributed throughout the network also make for more points of attack, the thinking goes. One of the biggest touted benefits of the upcoming 5G rollout is the speed and volume of the data that will be able to move through the system. The increase in speed and decrease in latency expected in the 5G era is due in part to a relatively new concept in the world of wireless: mobile edge computing. This new technology locates cloud computing and data processing functions at the edge of the cellular network where the RAN architecture is, rather than in traditional data centers like servers and network hubs. This new architecture would drastically cut down on latency, and would allow -- at least in the most hyped up versions of a hypothetical future under 5G -- for new uses such as surgery performed in real time in remote locations by doctors who are far away from the patient or remote operation of vehicles, and for uses not yet determined. When it comes to these new types of uses for data, the more important the data, the more important the vendor of the equipment that data is passing through. Hence the “sensitivity” of the core. The emergence of 5G adds a complication in that the notion of core becomes effectively physically distributed throughout the network. Different countries have constructed and designed their mobile wireless networks differently, complicating matters further when thinking about what is core and what is non-core. New developments in RAN equipment, 5G watchers point out, can segregate the network into two layers, or planes: the control plane and the user plane. One helpful metaphor posits the wireless network as a city’s bus system. The control plane is the dispatch center that plans bus routes and manages the traffic. The user plane, also known as the data plane, is the actual street grid with busses full of people: the data. The prevalence and importance of data in smart homes, hospitals, utilities infrastructure, and commerce is only set to increase under 5G, and likely exponentially so. Because new updates to RAN equipment can segregate data off on the user plane, away from the control plane, Huawei-made RAN equipment is harmless in the 5G network, proponents argue. With regards to regulatory policy, “the concept of how you define the core will be up to the individual countries,” according to Huawei’s Backhouse. It is, he explains, not as simple as pointing to one piece of equipment and defining it as core or noncore. It will depend on the equipment’s functionality, which will vary from network to network and country to country, he said. “We believe a lot of people have taken threat models and security architectures from the 3G era and brought them into the 5G era without understanding all of the other changes that have gone on around that,” said a Telus executive, who spoke to The Wire Report on the condition of anonymity. *** Telus is one of the companies that will have to thread the needle in terms of balancing its 5G ambitions with a national- and cybersecurity concerns, as the company has invested heavily in using Huawei gear on their networks over the past 10 years. The other companies that would be most-affected by a ban are Bell and SaskTel. According to the Telus executive who spoke with The Wire Report on the condition of anonymity, there is not much risk in having Huawei gear, so long as it’s only RAN equipment like antennas and radios. It’s already been there for years. Telus and Bell use Huawei gear in its control plane, and Telus says it carries much the same risk as any other vendor. “We still maintain that the core is the wrong place to put a piece of equipment from Huawei because it is potentially more susceptible to interception. It’s a more attractive place for an attacker to be,” the executive said. “At the same time, we know from doing penetration tests on that type of activity against our core network, that everything there has the potential to have backdoors in it: Cisco gear, Juniper gear, Ericsson gear, Huawei gear,” the Telus executive said. Telus is not planning on using Huawei’s gear in the core of the network, nor in any of its planned mobile edge computing. There are not many suppliers for for 5G RAN equipment. The top tier of manufacturers, according to OpenSignal’s Fogg and echoed by the Telus executive, are confined to Huawei, Ericsson AB, and Nokia Corp., while a second tier is comprised of ZTE Corp. (also a Chinese corporation), and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. The Telus executive said that the company had effectively ruled out Nokia equipment, saying it wouldn’t meet Telus’ requirements. “We don’t think that it’s workable for us as a tier one carrier,” the Telus executive said. To hear Telus tell it, there are only two remaining suppliers for RAN gear for a 5G roll out: Huawei and Erricsson. Telus has also made efforts to point out, both in an interview and in its secret briefing to the government, that Ericsson and Nokia also have research and development and manufacturing facilities located in China. Rogers Communications Inc., which declined an interview for this story, has said it will be using Ericsson gear for its 5G roll out. In May, Rogers’ vice chairman Philip Lind said that Huawei should be banned from the country’s 5G networks. “The idea of Huawei controlling, or potentially controlling our communication system in Canada is crazy,” he said in an interview with BNN Bloomberg. “I don’t think they should be allowed to.” Should the government issue a blanket ban on Huawei gear in 5G networks, companies like Bell and Telus would have to rip out and replace Huawei gear already present on their networks. It has been reported that a retroactive ban on Huawei gear would result in as much as a $1 billion loss for the company, though some analysts have questioned that number. In documents from a presentation Telus gave to Innovation, Science, and Economic Development earlier this year obtained by The Wire Report throuhg access to information, the company told the government that any retroactive Huawei ban would “greatly delay the deployment of 5G in Canada.” In the documents they also point out that the CEO of British telecom giant Vodafone Group Plc. has also noted that a Huawei ban would “significantly hamper” the 5G rollout in that country. The Huawei RAN equipment used by Telus isn’t interoperable with other kinds of RAN equipment. A scenario in which Telus couldn’t use the Huawei gear from its existing 4G networks could mean significant harm for the company, Telus argued in documents presented to ISED, saying that the success of any possible 5G network necessarily flows from the strength of its 4G network. “Since 5G standards do not support cross-vendor aggregation of 4G and 5G connections, Canadian operators must use the same radio suppliers in 4G and 5G infrastructure to deliver 5G network speeds and performance that are higher than 4G,” the company wrote in its presentation to the government. The Telus executive said that while there is a potential technological solution called Open RAN that would allow for a level of interoperability, the technology is too far off to make sense for the Canadian 5G roll out. The U.S. government, the Telus executive said, is “trying to pressure Nokia and Ericsson and Samsung to build a framework where individual 5G radios could plug into an existing 4G base station. And we just don’t see that either happening in a timely enough way for us to launch 5G. It’s at least a technology that’s three years out,” he said. On Oct. 27, the British newspaper The Sunday Times reported that the British government was set to allow Huawei access to what the paper called the “non-contentious” parts of the country’s 5G network. The Dutch government in July established “extra high standards,” according to reporting by Reuters, but stopped short of banning Huawei from the 5G roll out. Last week the German government also declined to ban Huawei from their 5G networks; all German telecom companies use the Chinese giant on their networks, according to reporting by the BBC. While companies that use Huawei gear have said that a ban on the equipment in the 5G network would delay Canada’s 5G roll out, it remains unclear exactly what impact that will have. Fogg, the OpenSignal analyst, pointed out that they may be benefits to not being amongst the first batch. Because 5G technology is so new, there exist the early pitfalls that come with every new technology, Fogg said. Switzerland, South Korea and the U.S. have begun 5G rollouts, while Canada won’t auction the 3.5 GHz spectrum-- considered important for the 5G rollout -- until next year. “It’s clear that Canada is not one of the first batch and won’t be,” Fogg said in a phone interview. “But the bigger question is: does it matter? Because at the moment we’re in the phase of 5G where it’s very bleeding edge.” “In some ways, not launching as one of the first countries means that Canada can skip some of that pain. So the bigger question is: when is the right time to launch to get the best balance between getting benefits quickly from 5G, but avoiding as much of the bleeding edge pain as possible?” According to the Telus executive, the reason Huawei gear is so useful in Canada because of the unique mixture of spectrum policy in the country, laying the responsibility for the state of affairs at the feet of Canadian spectrum allocation policies. “So we have this unique brew of the types of radio waves that we use for 3G and 4G networks that are not 100 per cent dissimilar, but it’s a unique combination around the world. And what that means for equipment manufacturers is they kind of have to make a special product for us,” the executive said. One of the benefits of using Huawei equipment is that the company has been willing to customize its equipment. The Telus executive offered a metaphor for the type of equipment Huawei alone can offer: Canadian network operators can’t just use a regular hamburger, they need a turkey burger with a whole wheat bun and special ingredients. “The federal government very knowingly created that environment as a mechanism to support increasing competition,” the executive said. — With reporting by Michael Lee-Murphy at mleemurphy@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca Clarification: The story has been updated to reflect that Rogers declined an interview for the story , rather than to comment.

5G & Huawei: An explainer

News | October 29, 2019

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

FREE TRIAL

SUBSCRIBE

Inside The Wire Report

Information

Hill Times Publishing

Get in Touch With Us

5G & Huawei: An explainer

News | October 29, 2019

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

FREE TRIAL

SUBSCRIBE

Q&A: Regulatory environment has pushed Bell, Rogers to spend outside telecoms, says CTA president

From cellphone to cell: Ottawa man charged in $7M phone heist

Canada lagging behind other countries on 5G performance: report

Related Stories

Canada lagging behind other countries on 5G performance: report

Q&A: Private 5G networks will soon see a meteoric rise in Canada, says industry leader

‘That’s the cost of doing business’: Joly says telcos won’t be compensated for complying with cybersecurity orders

Experts say 6G networks still years away, but Canada’s already preparing for the technology of the future

Reuse & Permissions

Inside The Wire Report

Information

Hill Times Publishing

Get in Touch With Us