Quectel has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Japanese electronics firm Renesas demanding it immediately stop making false accusations about Quectel and its IoT modules and renounce a September 2023 PowerPoint presentation titled “Attacking Quectel Sockets” that Renesas sent to Quectel customers.

The Renesas document asserts that Quectel’s modules are on a US government banned list and that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted a request from the US House of Representatives to ban Quectel’s IoT modules.

Quectel says both statements are untrue and defamatory, and is demanding a retraction and correction from Renesas.

“It has recently come to our attention that a number of competitors are propagating false and defamatory rumours and distributing material containing false and defamatory statements to Quectel’s customers and potential customers,” said Norbert Muhrer, president of Quectel. “We will vigorously defend ourselves against false claims and we will not tolerate untrue and defamatory practices targeting Quectel and its customers. To be clear, Quectel’s IoT modules are not, and never have been, on the FCC’s Covered List or any other US government agency list that would subject Quectel or its products to restrictions of any kind.”

Newsdesk contacted Renesas (www.renesas.com) asking it to comment and received the following statement: “We are aware of the matter and currently examining the accusation. We have no comment at this time.”

Quectel has been reaching out to US government officials to correct fundamental misunderstandings about its IoT module technology. Quectel says its modules do not pose any risk to national security or privacy, and that it does not have access to any data on its customers’ devices, much less control or manage any data. Rather, the makers of the devices into which its modules are placed have full control of all such data.

Quectel (www.quectel.com) has retained the independent security firm Finite State (finitestate.io), which is auditing and penetration-testing the security of Quectel’s modules. Its work includes security testing, software supply chain visibility and software risk management. Quectel was given high marks by Finite State for its cyber security.