Google is being asked to ‘reconsider’ Huawei relationship by US lawmakers

Chinese smartphone companies have been under a lot of scrutiny this year by the US government, and Huawei has seen massive blows to its plans in the States because of that. Now, the US government is apparently pressuring Google to “reconsider” its relationship with the company.

Reuters today reports that some US lawmakers from both the Democratic and Republican parties have asked Google’s parent company Alphabet to “reconsider” its relationship with Huawei. Google has long had a pretty decent relationship with the Chinese company, partnering with them on the Nexus 6P, as well as offering support for plenty of Google’s software initiatives on Huawei devices.

A good example of this is Google’s RCS initiative. Huawei signed on in full support, and earlier this year Congress was quick to scrutinize Google for that deal.

Now, lawmakers are pressuring Google’s further cooperation with Huawei. A letter sent to Sundar Pichai regarding the decision not to renew “Project Maven” brings up the lawmakers’ stance on the relationship.

While we regret that Google did not want to continue a long and fruitful tradition of collaboration between the military and technology companies, we are even more disappointed that Google apparently is more willing to support the Chinese Communist Party than the U.S. military…

While saying that Google is “willing to support the Chinese Communist Party” is absolutely a massive stretch, it clearly outlines the view government officials have of Huawei. A Google spokesperson had to say in response to this:

Like many U.S. companies, we have agreements with dozens of OEMs (manufacturers) around the world, including Huawei. We do not provide special access to Google user data as part of these agreement, and our agreements include privacy and security protections for use data.

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