Trump signs order to protect U.S. networks from foreign espionage
Source: Washington Post
Amid a deepening trade war with China, President Trump on Wednesday declared a national emergency to protect U.S. communications networks in a move that gives the federal government broad powers to bar American companies from doing business with certain foreign suppliers including the Chinese firm Huawei.
Trump declared the emergency in the form of an executive order that says foreign adversaries are exploiting vulnerabilities in U.S. telecom technology and services. It singles out economic and industrial espionage as areas of particular concern. The order authorizes the commerce secretary to block transactions involving communications technologies built by firms controlled by a foreign adversary that puts U.S. security at unacceptable risk or poses a threat of espionage or sabotage to networks that underpin the day-to-day running of vital public services.
Wednesdays announcement was expected nearly a year ago, and comes as neither Washington nor Beijing appears willing to back down in their ongoing economic dispute. The National Economic Council, which had blocked the move for months, dropped its objection as trade talks hit an impasse, said one official.
Trumps executive order does not immediately exclude any specific firms or countries, but certainly will not lessen tensions with Beijing. It is consistent with Trumps increasingly aggressive tack against China in which he has used tariffs as economic weapons, a tactic that he believes to be popular with his political base. The move also boosts the administrations somewhat uphill effort to persuade allies and partners in Europe to bar Huawei, which officials say is beholden to the Chinese government, from their next-generation 5G wireless networks.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-signs-order-to-protect-us-networks-from-foreign-espionage-a-move-that-appears-to-target-china/2019/05/15/d982ec50-7727-11e9-bd25-c989555e7766_story.html
Full title: Trump signs order to protect U.S. networks from foreign espionage, a move that appears to target China
greatauntoftriplets
(175,749 posts)C_U_L8R
(45,020 posts)Apparently Trumpdoofus took that joke seriously. Doh.
yaesu
(8,020 posts)Turbineguy
(37,365 posts)Today President Trump conferred U.S. citizenship on all persons working in the Russian government security apparatus.