US government bans sales of Huawei and ZTE over national security risk

The U.S. government has moved against allowing new telecommunications equipment from several Chinese tech giants to enter the United States over national security concerns.

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The announcement comes from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which said on Friday that it had blocked the sale or import of equipment made by Huawei Technologies, ZTE, surveillance equipment maker Dahua Technology, video surveillance firm Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology and telecommunications firm Hytera Communications. These official bans are the latest in the U.S. government's moves to protect Americans from unwanted spying by Chinese tech giants.

"These new rules are an important part of our ongoing actions to protect the American people from national security threats involving telecommunications," said FCC chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a statement. There has been no comment by Washington or the majority of the now-banned companies at the time of reporting, with only Hikvision writing in a statement:

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"This decision by the FCC will do nothing to protect U.S. national security, but will do a great deal to make it more harmful and more expensive for U.S. small businesses, local authorities, school districts, and individual consumers to protect themselves, their homes, businesses, and property." Hikvisio further added that it will comply with U.S. laws and will be in "in full compliance".

In other news, a cryptocurrency project attempted to pull off a publicity stunt when they created a $600,000, 30-foot-long, 12,000-pound statue of Elon Musk's head on a goat's body straddling a rocket. Unfortunately for the crypto team, the stunt didn't work, as it didn't even get on the radar of Musk. More on that story below.

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