US to ban new foreign-made consumer internet routers

The Federal Communications Commission in the US has updated its Covered List to include all consumer-grade routers produced in foreign countries. Routers are the boxes in every home that connect computers, phones, and smart devices to the internet.

This followed a determination by a White House-convened Executive Branch interagency body with
appropriate national security expertise that such routers “pose unacceptable risks to the national
security of the United States or the safety and security of United States persons.”

The Executive Branch determination noted that foreign-produced routers introduce “a supply
chain vulnerability that could disrupt the U.S. economy, critical infrastructure, and national defense”
and pose “a severe cybersecurity risk that could be leveraged to immediately and severely
disrupt U.S. critical infrastructure and directly harm U.S. persons.”

President Trump’s 2025 National Security Strategy stated: “the United States must never be
dependent on any outside power for core components—from raw materials to parts to finished
products—necessary to the nation’s defense or economy. We must re-secure our own independent
and reliable access to the goods we need to defend ourselves and preserve our way of life.”

Malicious actors have exploited security gaps in foreign-made routers to attack American households, disrupt networks, enable espionage, and facilitate intellectual property theft. Foreign made routers were also involved in the Volt, Flax, and Salt Typhoon cyberattacks targeting vital U.S. infrastructure.

This new action does not impact a consumer’s continued use of routers they previously acquired. Nor does it prevent retailers from continuing to sell, import, or market router models approved previously through the FCC’s equipment authorization process. By operation of the FCC’s Covered List rules, the restrictions imposed today apply to new device models.