Network gear vendors TP-Link Systems and Netgear have become embroiled in a legal spat over claims of Chinese espionage.

In a lawsuit filed in Delaware this week, TP-Link affirmed that it is a U.S.-based company incorporated and headquartered in Irvine, California, following a restructuring last year that saw its global business split from its Chinese counterpart in response to U.S. government scrutiny.

As reported by The Register, TP-Link’s filing accuses the California, U.S.-based Netgear of “falsely [casting] TP-Link and its products as infiltrated by the Chinese government,” pointing to claims made in Netgear’s earnings calls.

“During a February 5, 2025 earnings call for Netgear investors, media personnel, and networking product partners and consumers, Netgear’s chief executive officer C.J. Prober referred to ‘TP-Link as a national security risk’ and stated that ‘TP-Link’s role in some of these typhoons [i.e., well-known cyberattacks] that the U.S. is facing’ had been ‘exposed’ by a ‘Microsoft blog’ post,” claimed TP-Link in one example.

This purportedly went against the spirit of a legal agreement made between the firms to resolve various patent-related lawsuits filed by Netgear against TP-Link. This deal was made in August last year, around the same time the Department of Defense began investigating TP-Link amid fears that vulnerabilities in its routers could be exploited by the Chinese government.

As part of the $135 million settlement, Netgear was said to have agreed to stop making disparaging, derogatory, and false statements about TP-Link.

TP-Link alleges Netgear has violated this particular clause, causing it to lose “well over a billion dollars in sales.”

In a statement to The Register, Netgear responded by saying it was aware of TP-Link’s lawsuit, and that its “claims are without merit and we intend to respond through the appropriate legal channels,” while adding it “remains focused on its commitment to innovation, product security, and serving our customers."

Founded in China in 1996, TP-Link’s predecessor has branched into two distinct businesses: TP-Link Technologies, still based in Shenzhen, China, and the U.S.-based TP-Link Systems.

This move doesn’t seem to have assuaged authorities, with U.S. lawmakers this week urging the United States Commerce Department to investigate and potentially ban TP-Link’s networking products from sale in the U.S.

TP-Link refuted these accusations.

The Netgear/TP-Link drama comes against the backdrop of escalating tensions between the U.S. and China, which has seen Nvidia held back in selling its AI-native Blackwell chips to the Middle Kingdom

Over in Europe, meanwhile, telecom giants such as Nokia have been vocal in calling for Chinese vendors to be banned from the region, with Germany and Finland reportedly set to rip and replace infrastructure from the likes of Huawei, and the European Commission purportedly seeking a European Union-wide ban.