Government Urged to Ban Chinese Lidar Sensors From US Weapons, Critical Sectors

A self-driving, 132-foot military ship sits at a maritime terminal in San Diego on May 2, 2016. AP Photo/Julie Watson

The U.S. government should ban Chinese light detection and ranging (lidar) sensors from its military equipment and other critical sectors, a Washington-based think tank has said.

In a research memo published on Dec. 2, the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) said that using Chinese-made lidar sensors could expose the U.S. military and civilian infrastructure to hacking and sabotage during a conflict.

Lidar sensors use lasers to scan the environment and transmit the data to create high-precision three-dimensional maps.

The technology has a wide range of civilian and military uses, from robotic cars and cranes to missile guidance systems.

In November 2023, 20 bipartisan lawmakers, led by Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), former chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), the committee’s ranking Democrat member, urged the Biden administration to investigate all Chinese lidar tech companies over national security concerns.

In September, the Commerce Department proposed a ban on the sale or importation of connected vehicles from China or Russia. The FDD said the proposed ban, which “does not explicitly cover [lidar] systems or other use cases beyond vehicles,” begins to address the risks of Chinese lidars but leaves “many broader vulnerabilities unaddressed.”

In the memo, the FDD said lidar sensors use advanced processors that can hide malicious code or malware backdoors that are difficult to detect.

The malware embedded by “a malicious manufacturer under the control of an adversarial nation” in lidar systems could trigger or disable the sensors at any predetermined time, the foundation stated.

With Chinese manufacturers dominating the global lidar market, the report stated, Chinese-made sensors in the United States “often serve as essential nodes within interconnected public safety, transportation, and utility systems,” potentially making them vulnerable to Beijing’s espionage and sabotage.

The FDD mentioned a previous bulletin from the Estonian intelligence service, which cited “credible information about a Chinese manufacturer working on [lidar] systems for self-driving cars that are intended to scan the car’s entire surroundings and transmit the information to a database in China.”

The bulletin did not mention whether the company was state-owned or private. However, under Chinese law, all individuals, organizations, and institutions in China are obligated to support national intelligence work.

The FDD also cited an investment disclosure of Hesai, a world-leading Chinese manufacturer of automotive lidar.

The document mentioned the Chinese regime’s “significant oversight and discretion over” the company’s business operation and said that it “may influence or intervene in” its operations at any time.

A lidar sensor from the Hesai company on top of a “robotaxi” autonomous vehicle developed by Baidu Apollo as it drives along a street in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, China, on July 10, 2022. (Jade Gao/AFP via Getty Images)

Hesai is currently suing the Department of Defense (DOD) for including it on a list of Chinese military companies. Hesai has denied any connection with the Chinese communist regime or its military.

According to a court document filed in October, the DOD had delisted Hesai and re-listed it, saying the company “continues to meet the requirements for inclusion.”

The FDD urged Congress and the DOD to ensure that Hesai and other Chinese lidar makers stay on the list and are “thoroughly investigated” and called for an explicit ban of lidar sensors made by “companies based in foreign countries of concern” from the DOD’s supply chain.

It also urged the Commerce Department’s Information and Communications Technology and Services unit to assess the risks of Chinese lidars and consider banning them from “critical infrastructure sectors such as transportation, energy grids, public safety, and defense systems.

Other recommendations include regulating lidar data usage, sector-specific cybersecurity standards for lidar systems in critical infrastructure, state-level procurement bans, and friend-shoring of lidar supply chains.

The Epoch Times reached out to both the Commerce Department and Hesai for comment but received no responses by publication time.