March 23 (Reuters) - The U.S. Federal Communications Commission said on Monday it was banning the import of all new foreign-made consumer routers, the latest crackdown on Chinese-made electronic gear over security concerns.
China is estimated to control at least 60% of the U.S. market for home routers, boxes that connect computers, phones, and smart devices to the internet.
The FCC order does not impact the import or use of existing models, but will ban new ones.
The agency said a White House-convened review deemed imported routers pose "a severe cybersecurity risk that could be leveraged to immediately and severely disrupt U.S. critical infrastructure."
It said malicious actors had exploited security gaps in foreign-made routers "to attack households, disrupt networks, enable espionage, and facilitate intellectual property theft," citing their role in major hacks like Volt and Salt Typhoon.
"Today's tremendous decision by the FCC and the Trump administration protects our country against China's relentless cyberattacks and makes it clear that these devices should be excluded from our critical infrastructure," Moolenaar said. "Routers are key to keeping us all connected and we cannot allow Chinese technology to be at the center of that."
www.reuters.com
