US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo held a press conference on the 5th local time to announce the launch of the “Clean Network” plan to protect the privacy of US citizens and sensitive information of US companies. This plan covers 5 related areas including operators and transmission to APP.

1. 5G “Clean Network” Plan

It is understood that the U.S. State Department launched the 5G Clean Path program on April 29. All network information exchanges related to U.S. diplomatic agencies must go through reliable 5G telecommunications equipment, and the untrusted suppliers are named Huawei and ZTE.

Pompeo announced on the 5th that it will expand the 5G Clean Path plan and launch the Clean Network. He pointed out that this plan includes operators responsible for international telecommunications services, application stores, applications (APP), cloud and submarine cables.

The specific measures are as follows:

First, Chinese operators are not allowed to connect to the U.S. telecommunications network, claiming that it “poses a threat” to U.S. national security and should not provide the U.S. with international telecommunications services.

Second, the Chinese application was removed from the US mobile application store.

Thirdly, Chinese smartphone manufacturers such as Huawei are not allowed to pre-install or otherwise obtain downloadable apps in their app stores.

Fourth, the most sensitive personal information of U.S. citizens and the most valuable intellectual property rights of U.S. companies, including research on the new crown pneumonia vaccine, are not allowed to be stored and processed on some cloud systems, unless these cloud systems do not allow Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent, China Mobile, China Telecom and other companies to visit.

Fifth, to ensure that the submarine cables connecting the United States and the global Internet will not be “massively destroyed by China to gather intelligence”, it will work with foreign partners to ensure that submarine cables around the world will not be similarly damaged.

The statement also called on US allies and partners in governments and industries around the world to join in to ensure that data is not maliciously violated and to ensure “national security.”

2. Announcing the list of 5G clean networks to combat China

The U.S. State Department website previously published a list of so-called 5G clean networks, claiming that 27 operators around the world have abandoned Huawei and ZTE equipment in 5G network construction, thus building a 5G clean network and ensuring the highest security standards.

These so-called model countries including Britain, Czech Republic, Poland, Sweden, Estonia, Romania, Denmark, Latvia and so on. In order to combat China, are really doing everything.

When it comes to the removal of Chinese apps, because “untrusted” apps such as TikTok and WeChat are not based in the United States, and suspect that they will pose a “great threat” to the personal privacy of American citizens. He also added at the meeting that the U.S. State Department will work with the Department of Commerce and the Department of Defense to restrict the rights of Chinese cloud service providers to collect, store and process data in the United States.

A few days before this conference, US President Trump stated on Air Force One that he would block the use of Chinese APP TikTok in the United States. TikTok was launched by ByteDance in 2017. According to SensorTower statistics, under the epidemic situation, TikTok has achieved rapid business growth, with downloads exceeding 2 billion times in April.

On Sunday, Microsoft confirmed that it had negotiated with ByteDance to acquire TikTok’s business in the United States and several other countries. Microsoft said in a statement that it will continue to cooperate with the U.S. government on the transaction and intends to conclude negotiations before September 15. Foreign media reported on Wednesday that Microsoft’s acquisition of TikTok may cost $30 billion in investment.

3. Responds from China

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin stated at a regular press conference of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the 3rd that the United States has generalized the concept of national security, and without any evidence, it has presumed guilt and issued threats against relevant companies, which is contrary to the market. Economic principles have exposed the hypocrisy and typical double standards of the US in maintaining fairness and freedom, and violated the WTO’s principles of openness, transparency, and non-discrimination.

China firmly opposes this. We call on some people in the US to listen carefully to the voice of the international community, provide an open, fair, just, and non-discriminatory business environment for market players from all countries to invest and operate in the US, and stop politicizing economic and trade issues and stop abusing the concept of national security, and implement discriminatory and exclusive policies.