Expressing Sense of the House That Stakeholders in 5G Communications Infrastructure Should Carefully Consider and Adhere to ``The Prague Proposals''

Floor Speech

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Mr. SOTO. Madam Speaker, I thank Chairman Doyle and Ranking Member Latta, as well as Representative Flores, for all of their work and the work of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

It is essential that the United States be at the forefront of the deployment and development of 5G technologies. 5G is the infrastructure that will allow our country to be the leader in the 21st century economy.

There is fundamental importance of internet connectivity across the country for both metropolitan and rural areas, highlighting both cities and rural areas, and this is a need that telecom technology must be developed in a practical but secure way. In a district like mine, we have urban, suburban, and rural, so we look out for all of these different areas.

The equipment and services in U.S. communications networks provide critical infrastructure for 5G deployment, making them appealing targets for foreign adversaries. For these companies in particular, experts have noted that China has ``the means, opportunity, and motive to use telecommunications companies for malicious purposes.''

We have seen this problem in Chinese telecom chips made by companies like Huawei and other supply chain security issues that have been making news as of late.

We started local efforts in Florida's Ninth Congressional District, along with the University of Central Florida and others, to produce components that are tamper-resistant sensors developed at national foundries, like the BRIDG facility in central Florida. But we must do more.

For these reasons, I am proud to be the Democratic colead on H. Res. 575. This resolution provides a sense of the House of Representatives that developers of 5G technologies abide by wireless technology recommendations made at the Prague 5G Security Conference.

Some of these Prague Proposals include communications networks and services be designed with resilience and security in mind, and every country is free, in accordance with international law, to have security requirements.

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Mr. SOTO. Policies governing 5G deployment should be guided by principles of transparency and equitability. Stakeholders should conduct regular vulnerability assessments and risk mitigation of products. And customers must be able to be informed about the origin of components in software that affect the security level of the products they use.

Madam Speaker, I thank Chairman Doyle, Mr. Flores, Mr. Latta, and others for their great work, and I urge everyone to support H. Res. 575.

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