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On December 18, 2024, the Wall Street Journal reported that “U.S. authorities are investigating whether a Chinese company whose popular home-internet routers have been linked to cyberattacks poses a national-security risk and are considering banning the devices.” I learned a few interesting facts beyond the top-line story:

  • “The router-manufacturer TP-Link, established in China, has roughly 65% of the U.S. market for routers for homes and small businesses.” TP-Link’s home and small business marketshare for routers was only 20% in 2019. The Wall Street Journal attributes the jump to an increase in working from home beginning in 2020 and TP-Link’s low prices.
  • “The Justice Department is investigating whether the price discrepancies violate a federal law that prohibits attempts at monopolies by selling products for less than they cost to make…” (Note: For whatever it is worth, I do not think TP-Link is strikingly cheap compared to other “popular” consumer routers and access points, but I could be off.)
  • TP-Link devices are used by the Department of Defense, Drug Enforcement Agency, NASA, and other agencies.
  • “An analysis from Microsoft published in October found that a Chinese hacking entity maintains a large network of compromised network devices mostly comprising thousands of TP-Link routers.”
  • According to the Journal, people familiar with the TP-Link investigation have stated that the company does not engage with security researches complainted about security flaws in TP-Link products.
  • “TP-Link routers don’t appear to be related to China’s alleged breaches of at least eight U.S. telecom firms by a group dubbed Salt Typhoon…” Chinese hackers instead targeted out-of-date routers built by Cisco and Netgear.
  • Taiwan has banned government and educational facilities from using TP-Link routers. India issued a warning in 2024 that TP-Link routers present a security risk.

[Source: U.S. Weighs Ban on Chinese-Made Router in Millions of American Homes (Wall Street Journal). Original Link. Archived Link.]

I used a TP-Link router for several years before upgrading to a MikroTik hAP ac3 router. As of the writing of the instant post, I still use a TP-Link wireless access point (it is a pure AP, no router capabilities), but I am in the process of swapping it out for a Netgear router with OpenWrt, which I will use as an Access Point instead of a router.