DPP legislator wants ban of products due to close ties to China.
Several Taiwan-based media outlets have stated Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Chun-hsien urged the government to ban the purchase of and remove Fortinet security and Zoom communications products manufactured in China.
According to the media outlets the Legislator believed Taiwan should “beware of these companies, which on the surface are US firms”, but, “follow orders from Beijing”.
“We have no way of finding out their Chinese connection unless someone reports them,” he said. “We should not procrastinate on dealing with this issue, as Taiwan, of all countries, faces the severest national security threat from China.”
The Taiwanese Government was compiling a list of approved information security products on the inter-entity supply contract.
According to the Government in April this year, Vice Premier and leader of the Executive Yuan’s overall cyber security mission Chen Chi-mai enacted the Government’s Cyber Security Management Act in 2020, with the goal of implementing information and data security measures, as well as defending the nation’s critical communications infrastructure.
The act stipulates that all organisations introducing information and communication systems should not utilise goods or services that raise data security concerns. In addition, procurement priority should focus on domestically produced goods and services, or those from government-contracted suppliers.
In response to changing developments surrounding the COVID-19 outbreak, many organisations have the option to use remote video conferencing technology to coordinate with separate or distant offices as a means of minimising business disruptions.
At the time, The Executive Yuan’s Department of Cyber Security (DCS) also formally issued an advisory to all government organisations and specific non-government agencies that “should it become operationally necessary to engage in video conferencing, the underlying video software to be used should not have associated security or privacy concerns, such as the Zoom video communication service”.
