The Huawei phone ban and what it means for consumers

By the second quarter of 2018, Huawei overtook Apple in the smartphone market to become the second largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. This is in terms of the shipment of the phones and there has been a tremendous year-over-year change from 2017 to 2018. But 2018 was a mixed bag of developments for the Chinese smartphone brand. In the beginning of the year the company had to tackle the loss of AT&T carrier support. In February 2018, FBI Director Chris Wray issued a warning against the purchase of Huawei phones. From there on it has been a rough year for the brand with several new developments in this matter.

The Huawei phone ban facts you should know

Stating privacy concerns and data security issues as the reason, the Pentagon announced a ban on selling Huawei phones to the US military bases. This slowly crept to the consumer smartphone market. The trade war between the US and China is a burning issue. Amidst this the growth of Huawei as a leading telecommunications company, a major contributor in the 5G development has caused mixed reactions from around the world. Suspecting the use of Huawei hardware to spy on the other countries and therefore taking national security as the priority, the US banned the sale of phones from this brand. This led to several organization’s around the world with US based clients, banning their employees from bringing Huawei devices to the workplace. The real blow came when Google announced that it would not be issuing future updates to Huawei phones.

What should you do if you own a Huawei phone?

Google ban would be affecting the consumer market directly in several ways. Android is an open source project. Therefore, Huawei would still be able to use its base version of the operating system. But Google’s services like the PlayStore and the default apps like Google Maps, Gmail and others will not be available for the phones that Huawei releases in future. The manufacturer can still make up for it by using third party apps. For those owning a Huawei phone already, there is nothing much to worry about. They would be able to use their phone and the Google services on it.

Here are the countries that are banning Huawei phones:

1. US
2. Canada
3. Australia
4. New Zealand
5. Great Britain
6. Germany
7. Japan
8. Italy
9. India

According to the Chinese smartphone brand’s statement, “Huawei will continue to provide security updates and after-sales services to all existing Huawei and Honor smartphone and tablet products, covering those that have been sold and that are still in stock globally”. Therefore if you already own a Huawei smartphone you do not have to worry about losing Google support or not getting security patches in the future. But there is no guarantee that the existing phones might get future Android updates. There might be delayed updates tweaked for the AOSP (Android Open Source Project). The real effects will also be on the upcoming smartphones from this brand.

Should you buy a new Huawei phone?

As of now, if you reside in any of the countries that are likely to ban Huawei it would not be a good idea to buy a Huawei phone. This brand has lined up some brilliant smartphones with some spectacular cameras for release. But with the lack of clarity about the operating system and Google Services concerns, it is better to look for another option rather than a Huawei phone. It would be worth looking at other electronics products, you can find alternatives at Clever Shop List. The company might be able to survive without the support of Google for a while. But without concrete announcements from the company about its plans it is hard to make any guesses. Creating a new operating system based on AOSP and providing alternatives for Google Services might take a while.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes.