The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) has appealed to the German Federal Network Agency to exclude Chinese companies from the bidding process due to a lack of data security and transparency regarding the 5G mobile licenses. The STP wrote a letter to the President and the Advisory Council of the Federal Network Agency, emphasizing that as long as there are no effective data protection laws or legal certainty in China, data of international customers is not safe there. No company can successfully defend itself against interference by the Chinese state security. This also applies to the Chinese group Huawei, a cooperation partner of the three German bidder companies.

German companies that rely on Chinese suppliers in connection with 5G should ask themselves if they are committed to the National Action Plan for Economics and Human Rights of the German Federal Government, due to which German companies are also obliged to check whether supplier companies respect human rights. "Consumers in Germany must be able to rely on this action plan," emphasized Ulrich Delius, the STP's director, in Göttingen on Tuesday. Companies that are meticulous about following the German data protection regulations based on the General Data Protection Regulation must not just ignore such principles outside the EU. "China is an example of what happens when companies cooperate closely with the state security authorities when developing new products: In the Xinjiang region, the surveillance and persecution of the Uyghurs, the Kazakh, and the Kyrgyz people has been perfected."

The STP is convinced that even at Huawei, there are no clear boundaries between political influence by the Communist Party and entrepreneurial decisions. Therefore, the company's products offer no data security, Delius stated. Further, the company's pricing is neither transparent nor reasonable. "If you're interested in data protection, you should not just look out for the cheapest offer," the human rights advocate stated. This applies not only to private consumers, but also to the public sector.

In the spring of 2019, the Federal Network Agency will decide on the 5G licenses. Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the US have already decided against companies with Chinese cooperation partners – for security reasons.

Header image: Christine und Hagen Graf via Flickr