Most Android manufacturers — including Huawei — are what’s known as Google hardware partners. This relationship lets them build their phones around a collection of Google products, from apps like Google Maps and Assistant, to under-the-hood tools like location services or push notifications. While Google gives off the impression that Android is open and available to everyone, these services represent a quiet control that the company doesn’t often enforce over its hardware partners — though, as it has now proven, it certainly can.
With the recent order, the U.S. government forced Google’s hand. The U.S. Department of Commerce put Huawei on the “Entity List,” which blocks it from buying technology from U.S. companies without government approval. Huawei and Google now have three months to send updates to existing users. For new phones, Huawei may be able to use the open-source version of Android, but it can’t be a Google partner.
The distinction between using Android and being a Google partner seems messy from the outside, but “Android” technically refers to the core operating system that covers basic things like making phone calls or using the camera. The freely available version of Android is called the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and a company doesn’t have to be a partner to use it.
Most manufacturers like Huawei, however, do choose to become a Google partner. That means Huawei agrees to only make devices that use a collection of Google apps known as Google Mobile Services which includes things like Gmail, YouTube, and the Google Play Store. Under this arrangement, Huawei can’t, for example, make a phone that ships with Microsoft’s Bing and Edge instead of Google Search and Chrome.
Partners also have to meet certain security and compatibility conditions. In exchange, they get access to all of Google’s apps and infrastructure, making their phones much more appealing to customers worldwide than they would otherwise be. This arrangement is usually free, though manufacturers who sell in the EU pay a fee and are exempt from the all-or-nothing condition for complicated legal reasons.
According to Bryan Pon, PhD, mobile platform researcher and co-founder of the data analytics firm Caribou Data, this gives Google a lot of control over its platform. “Consumers are attached to the Google products and services that sit on top of the operating system,” explains Pon. “Google has very strong proprietary control over those, and in that sense wields tremendous power, irrespective of the operating system.”
Additionally, Huawei, and Google’s other partners, have to include a collection of developer tools called Google Play Services. These background tools let app developers easily do things like create push notifications, embed maps in their apps, or get a GPS location. Most Android apps distributed through the Google Play Store rely on some of these tools to provide features that are too expensive or difficult for every developer to build themselves.
As Pon explains, some of these tools are crucial features that would normally be part of an operating system. “They’re actually taking functionality out of the core platform,” Pon says. “They’re leaving Android open source, more and more, just a shell. And that core functionality is now part of just proprietary Google services.” Google does this to make it easier to update important features without waiting for a big Android update, but the result consolidates Google’s power over its platform.
[...] Even if we could assume the best about Google’s intentions to keep Android as open as possible — and Google did not respond to a request by OneZero for comment — the Huawei order demonstrates that Google’s control can be abused by other entities. If the U.S. were in a trade war with South Korea instead of China, Samsung phones — still the most popular in the world over — could face a similar fate. Google can reaffirm its commitment to being “open” and “free” all it wants, but ultimately it’s still a gatekeeper.
Related Stories
Report: Google argues the Huawei ban would hurt its Android monopoly
The Trump administration would probably describe its Huawei export ban as a move that improves national security by keeping China's pet telecom company out of the US market. According to a report from The Financial Times, Google's recent discussions with the US government actually argue that the Huawei ban is bad for national security. Google is reportedly asking for an exemption from the export ban.
The argument, reportedly, is that Huawei is currently dependent on Google for its Android smartphone software, and that dependence is a good thing for the US. The Financial Times quotes "one person with knowledge of the conversations" as saying, "Google has been arguing that by stopping it from dealing with Huawei, the US risks creating two kinds of Android operating system: the genuine version and a hybrid one. The hybrid one is likely to have more bugs in it than the Google one, and so could put Huawei phones more at risk of being hacked, not least by China."
[...] Google's control over the Android ecosystem—even when devices don't use the Google apps—means there is still some level of security and updateability going into these devices. Google's first argument in that Financial Times report is that more secure devices are better for national security.
The second argument in the above quote is that a ban would "create two kinds of Android" and hurt Google's monopoly over Android. If you're a smartphone manufacturer looking for a smartphone OS, Android is the only game in town. The latest worldwide OS market share numbers from the IDC show an 86.6/13.3 percent share between Android and iOS, respectively, with "Other" clocking in at 0.0 percent market share. Taken as a whole, the US has a smartphone OS monopoly.
More secure devices (used by foreign targets for NSA hacking) are better for national security? Nice try, Google.
Previously: Huawei Working on its Own OS to Prepare for "Worst-Case Scenario" of Being Deprived of Android
Huawei Hysteria is a False Alarm, Culture Secretary Tells MPs
Google Pulls Huawei's Android License
The Huawei Disaster Reveals Google's Iron Grip On Android
Huawei Calls on U.S. to Adjust its Approach to Tackle Cybersecurity Effectively
Huawei Clarifies Android Update Situation, Commits to Android Q for Last 2 Generations
Huawei last night launched an information campaign about the status of software updates on existing devices in the face of the company's troubles with the U.S. Commerce Department.
The important news is that Huawei is confirming to and committing to continues[sic] security and Android platform updates, specifically the upcoming release of Android Q.
In general the news is no surprise as certification and approval happens several months before the actual software update. With Huawei receiving a reprieve on updates, it means in general business continues as usual for the moment being.
Huawei Announces Nova 5 & Nova Pro in China: Introduces New Kirin 810 Chipset
Today Huawei announced the brand new Nova 5 series of smartphones. The company released the new Nova 5, Nova 5 Pro and Nova 5i in China with availability later this month. The new Nova 5 and 5 Pro are particularly interesting because they now represent Huawei's lowest priced devices with OLED displays, also featuring high-end cameras and SoC options.
The new Nova 5 and Nova 5 Pro are interesting phones because they are essentially the same device, with the peculiarity of having different SoC options: The Nova 5 in particular is the first phone to now introduce the new Kirin 810 chipset. The new chip features a combination of 2x Cortex A76 CPUs at up to 2.23GHz and 6x Cortex A55's at 1.88GHz. In terms of GPU, Huawei has opted for a Mali-G52MP6 running at 820MHz. It looks like the Kirin 810 is extremely well positioned to compete against Qualcomm's Snapdragon 730 SoC which was announced just back in April.
Previously: Huawei Working on its Own OS to Prepare for "Worst-Case Scenario" of Being Deprived of Android
Google Pulls Huawei's Android License
The Huawei Disaster Reveals Google's Iron Grip On Android
Huawei Calls on U.S. to Adjust its Approach to Tackle Cybersecurity Effectively
Google Doesn't Want Huawei Ban Because It Would Result in an Android Competitor
Trump reversed course on Huawei. What happens now?
Six weeks after Huawei was blacklisted by the US government, President Donald Trump had what the Chinese telecom firm described as a "U-turn." Trump said Saturday that "US companies can sell their equipment to Huawei," allowing the transactions won't present a "great, national emergency problem."
Trump's comments at the G20 in Japan came after a widely anticipated meeting with Chinese President Xi Jingping. The two sides met to discuss the impasse in the trade dispute, and Huawei, one of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world, has become a flash point in the battle.
In May, the US Commerce Department banned sales of American-made goods to Huawei without first obtaining a license. US officials have accused the company of working to undermine US national security and foreign policy interests. Trump said Huawei was still part of the ongoing trade discussions between Washington and Beijing, but for now, he would move to resume allowing US companies to sell parts to the Chinese firm.
Also at Android Authority and Business Insider:
President Trump has said US firms can continue selling to Huawei, apparently contradicting a Commerce Department trade blacklist on the Chinese tech firm.
See also: A China-U.S. Trade Truce Could Enshrine a Global Economic Shift
Previously: New Law Bans U.S. Government from Buying Equipment from Chinese Telecom Giants ZTE and Huawei
Huawei Working on its Own OS to Prepare for "Worst-Case Scenario" of Being Deprived of Android
Google Pulls Huawei's Android License
The Huawei Disaster Reveals Google's Iron Grip On Android
Huawei Calls on U.S. to Adjust its Approach to Tackle Cybersecurity Effectively
Google Doesn't Want Huawei Ban Because It Would Result in an Android Competitor
Huawei Soldiers on, Announces Nova 5 and Kirin 810
Related: U.S. Reaches Deal to Keep China's ZTE in Business: Congressional Aide
US Hits China's ZTE with $1 Billion Penalty
Huawei's HongMeng OS was supposed to be the company's answer to counter the Android license ban if it ended up meddling in the company consumer business. There were near-endless waves of rumors talking about software optimization and how it was faster than Google's mobile platform, but it looks like Huawei's Senior Vice President has finally cleared the air on the company's efforts towards HongMeng OS. Apparently, it is not going to be presented as an Android alternative for smartphones, but it will still have a variety of benefits.
Huawei board member and Senior Vice President Catherine Chen at a meeting in Brussels stated that HongMeng OS isn't designed for smartphones. That is rather strange to hear, especially when the Huawei co-founder repeatedly stated that the company's custom operating system is likely faster than Android or iOS, but lacks a competitive app ecosystem. Catherine also says that smartphone operating systems feature millions of lines of code, while HongMeng OS doesn't.
Even though she claims that HongMeng OS features an extremely low latency compared to a smartphone OS, it will be used in IoT-related applications, with the platform apparently being in development way before the Android license ban came into effect.
Previously: Google Pulls Huawei's Android License
The Huawei Disaster Reveals Google's Iron Grip On Android
Google Doesn't Want Huawei Ban Because It Would Result in an Android Competitor
Trump Administration Will Loosen Restrictions Against Huawei
What Huawei To Go: Hundreds Of Chinese Tech Giant's US Workers To Get Pink Slip
Huawei Unveils Harmony, Its Answer to Android, in Survival Bid
Huawei, the Chinese technology giant, on Friday unveiled its own mobile operating system, Harmony, in an effort to ensure that its fast-growing smartphone business can survive the United States government's clampdown on the firm.
Huawei has been at the mercy of the Trump administration for the past three months, ever since the Commerce Department began requiring that American companies apply for special permission to sell parts and technology to the Chinese firm, which Washington officials accuse of being a potential conduit for cyberspying by Beijing. The move effectively choked off Huawei's access to Google's Android software and American-made microchips and other hardware components, and put a big question mark over Huawei's future.
Although President Trump said in June that he would loosen some of the restrictions to allow American companies to continue working with Huawei, economic ties between the United States and China have grown more tense since then, and the prospect of immediate relief for Huawei seems more distant.
Unveiling Harmony at a Huawei developer conference in the southern city of Dongguan on Friday, Richard Yu, the head of the company's consumer business, said that the new operating system was designed to work not only on mobile phones, but on smart watches and other connected home devices as well. Indeed, the first Huawei products to run on Harmony will not be smartphones, but "smart screens" that the company plans to release later this year. Mr. Yu said that Harmony would gradually be incorporated into the company's other smart devices over the next three years. But there is no immediate plan, he said, to release Harmony-based phones.
Also at Bloomberg, XDA Developers, The Verge, TechCrunch, CNBC, CNN.
See also: Huawei's cross-platform HarmonyOS will ship in China in 2019, globally in 2020
Previously:
Google Pulls Huawei's Android License
The Huawei Disaster Reveals Google's Iron Grip On Android
Google Doesn't Want Huawei Ban Because It Would Result in an Android Competitor
Trump Administration Will Loosen Restrictions Against Huawei
Huawei's Android Alternative Lives on... for IoT
(Score: 3, Insightful) by krishnoid on Monday May 27 2019, @07:43AM (4 children)
With blackjack! And hookers!
I'm kind of surprised the Chinese government hasn't already picked up Android and made their own version of it. Social credit score, great firewall ... but no official state-sanctioned phone OS fork?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by ataradov on Monday May 27 2019, @07:57AM
The problem is not the Chinese market. They are fine there with AOSP and their own services.
The problem is that in the western world everyone needs Google Play. Even if you were to trust those Chinese services, half of them will not work or will be useless.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by janrinok on Monday May 27 2019, @07:58AM
They have already announced that they have 'something being prepared' for this eventuality, but as yet we do not know any details - particularly how advanced it currently is.
If they produced their own version of Android, how many countries would ban it for security reasons, exactly as is happening to Huawei's products now? For internal use it might be OK, but it would face stiff opposition globally.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Monday May 27 2019, @09:22AM
https://wccftech.com/huaweis-hongmeng-kirin-os-is-9-years-old-optimized-for-linux/ [wccftech.com]
It's coming.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Tuesday May 28 2019, @01:20PM
> made their own version of it
I am suprised that the "powers that be" have not taken Android and broken Google's control over it. I guess they are held in place by a few short term contracts and the ubiquity of google play store. I guess it is a very weak federation, and maybe the US govt using google as a pawn will break their hold over the federation...
(Score: 5, Interesting) by choose another one on Monday May 27 2019, @07:54AM (4 children)
What people usually miss comparing Huawei to Samsung and China to South Korea is that in China all those "essential" Google apps and services are blocked by the great firewall.
So how do the Chinese manage to do anything with their Android phones? Answer: they already have their own infrastructure on top of Android to replace Google's - App stores, Apps, Services the lot.
Huawei have tried and tested alternatives to all the Google stuff ready to go, because they have to for the home market - of course it's all in Chinese so there's probably a _lot_ of translation work to do, but that's about it. Oh, and then all your data and info is going to China instead of to Google, but I'm sure they'll
keep it secure and privatemonetize and abuse it just as well.If Google has to pull the plug on Samsung on the other hand, then Samsung has nothing - unless/until they do a deal with the only other source of a complete Android smartphone infrastructure, i.e. China...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @08:46AM (2 children)
Not exactly true that Samsung has nothing. They do have their own app store etc. Probably not the full suite of apps, but not nothing either.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Monday May 27 2019, @09:21AM (1 child)
Samsung could also intensify work on Tizen [wikipedia.org] if shit hit the fan (Huawei is prepping its own "HongMeng" OS [wccftech.com] that appears to be Linux-based).
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday May 27 2019, @04:41PM
If they've got any sense, they're already doing so. The current US govt. isn't exactly a reliable partner.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @02:35PM
Answer: Not Many.
Result: much less Huawei devices outside China, and incidentally less currency income for Huawei and China in general.
Seems like mission accomplished, from both security and trade war standpoints.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by takyon on Monday May 27 2019, @09:16AM
Huawei chief would be ‘the first to protest’ China retaliation to Trump ban [theverge.com]
CEO doing damage control, leaving the door open. The U.S. Commerce Department did grant Huawei a 90 day temporary license [engadget.com] to deliver updates to users (good time to throw some of that Chinese spyware at them, eh?).
Huawei can’t officially use microSD cards in its phones going forward [theverge.com]
Remember this story? Huawei Introduces a Memory Card That Fits into a Nano SIM Slot [soylentnews.org]
Suddenly that doesn't sound like such a bad idea, at least from Huawei's standpoint. They expected these issues years in advance and have planned for this moment.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @12:58PM
Android, both as a name and iconic symbol itself is a gender bias, no doubt. A mascot of
circumcisedpenis as a symbol of operation system, created and operated by CIA investment frontend ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-Tel [wikipedia.org] ) is maybe acceptable in Atlantic civilization for subjugated nations, but other ancient cultures on this planet (China, India) recognize it as very inappropriate.(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @04:12PM
I think more people should have a look at microG (basically a one-man operation)
https://microg.org/ [microg.org]
https://lineage.microg.org/ [microg.org]
https://github.com/microg [github.com]
https://github.com/microg/android_packages_apps_GmsCore/wiki [github.com]
https://github.com/microg/android_packages_apps_GmsCore/wiki/Implementation-Status [github.com]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @10:14PM (3 children)
Funny that only Huawei is targeted by the US govt.
How about all of the spying that Google and Facebook do? But no sanctions on Google or Facebook ...
Likely the same or worse than what Huawei might/does do?
Could this really be that Huawei is too far ahead in the 5G competition and the other multinationals
are using this move to slow them down since they apparently cannot compete with better products
(ie about money issues, not so much about spying)?
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Tuesday May 28 2019, @12:31AM (1 child)
It *could* be, but it's not. Google scrapes all your data (pretty much) and uses it to direct relevant ads to you. Sucks, but they protect it very well as it's the life-blood of their business. FaceBook scrapes all you data and uses it to push ads (and misinformation it seems) to you, and they also sell it, meaning who the hell knows where it's going. It's pretty easy for the government to request it though.
Huawei gathers the data and hands it to the Chinese government, which in general terms is better than FaceBook, or even Google as they have little direct effect on Westerner's lives .... unless of course they're in government, technology, healthcare, law enforcement, etc. The Chinese government can leverage that data pretty well, and backdoor access even more.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 28 2019, @01:16AM
Google and Facebook gathers the data and hands it to the US government.
See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program) [wikipedia.org]
"Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss"
We do get fooled again!
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Tuesday May 28 2019, @01:02PM
> Funny that only Huawei is targeted by the US govt.
I thought you were going to mention other Chinese players (I'm specifically thinking about OnePlus, but there are almost certainly others).