Facebook won’t allow Huawei to pre-install its apps on smartphones anymore, Reuters is reporting. It’s the latest example of Western tech companies cutting ties with the beleaguered Chinese telecom giant after President Trump issued an effective trade ban against it.
The decision won’t be as much of a blow to Huawei as Google and Arm cutting ties. Reuters reports that owners of its phones will still be able to download Facebook’s main app, Instagram, and WhatsApp, and will continue to receive Play Store updates, but new devices won’t ship with any of the software pre-installed. Huawei usually pre-installs apps such as Facebook and Twitter on its handsets. Whether Twitter will follow suit is unclear.
Facebook has apparently landed on a different calculus to deal with the trade ban than Google. Google has secured a temporary license to continue to send security updates to existing Huawei phones. Huawei phones currently in stores or “those which have not yet shipped or even been built” will still have the Google services pre-installed. Facebook, Reuters says, is denying pre-installs on “any phone which has not yet left the factory.”
Google itself isn’t happy with the situation. According to the Financial Times, it has told the US government that a “hybrid” Android OS from Huawei would be “more at risk of being hacked, not least by China.”
