Although MWC 2023 is now over, some event news keeps coming. Specifically, today we learned that Huawei tracked visitors to its booth.
Reports are emerging about Huawei’s installation of tracking devices on the “Huawei card” that the company gave to attendees who visited its booth.
Visitors who wanted to enter the Huawei booth received a “Huawei card”, which consisted of an identity card, a lanyard and a plastic. Visitors were obliged to take them with them during the exhibition and return them when leaving.
Apparently, some of the participants forgot to return the Huawei card. These same participants later noticed that on the back of the card there were small letters that read:
We used RFID and Bluetooth technology to collect the time spent by this Huawei card at the entrance to the Huawei exhibition area, real-time location information and the time spent by holders of this Huawei card inside the exhibition area. Huawei Exposure, such information will be collected and processed solely for the purpose of analyzing our guests’ general interests in our products to improve the quality of our service.
We will protect this information in accordance with our Privacy Policy.
This situation appears to have taken the GSMA by surprise. Asked about what happened, the organization answered saying:
Of course, you know that some vendors require booth visitors to remove their competitors and branded lanyards for obvious reasons, but the suggestion of tracking devices is a serious accusation. We’re investigating, but we don’t have any further details at this time.
That’s certainly not a good image for a company struggling to gain customers’ trust after being punished by the United States.
