UK Bans New Chinese Security Cameras on Sensitive Government Estates Over Security Concerns

Hikvision cameras in an electronic mall in Beijing on May 24, 2019. Fred Dufour/AFP via Getty Images

The UK’s government departments has been told to stop installing surveillance cameras made by Chinese companies and advised to replace existing ones, a Cabinet minister said on Thursday.

In a written statement to Parliament, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Oliver Dowden, who oversees Cabinet Office policies, said the decision was made “in light of the threat to the UK and the increasing capability and connectivity of these systems.”

It comes after Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner Fraser Sampson warned the government against using cameras made by Chinese companies Hikvision and Dahua.

Dowden said a review by the Government Security Group concluded that additional controls are required for the installation of visual surveillance systems on the government estate.

“Departments have therefore been instructed to cease deployment of such equipment onto sensitive sites, where it is produced by companies subject to the National Intelligence Law of the People’s Republic of China,” the statement reads.

The decision effectively bans surveillance equipment from any Chinese manufacturers as the National Intelligence Law requires all organisations and citizens to “support, assist, and cooperate with national intelligence efforts.”

Dowden said the ban is to “prevent any security risks materialising” because security considerations are “always paramount around these sites.”

“Additionally, departments have been advised that no such equipment should be connected to departmental core networks and that they should consider whether they should remove and replace such equipment where it is deployed on sensitive sites rather than awaiting any scheduled upgrades,” he added.

Dowden said departments had also been advised to consider doing the same at non-sensitive sites and that the government will “take further steps if and when they become necessary.”

Hikvision and Dahua

Sampson in April wrote to government ministers after The Telegraph reported that then-Health Secretary Sajid Javid had banned his department from buying Hikvision security cameras over  “ethical concerns,” saying the decision “must apply equally across all government departments, devolved administrations, and local authorities.”

The commissioner warned the government again in June after civil liberty group Big Brother Watch published a report saying 60 percent of public bodies that responded to its survey said they were using cameras made by Hikvision and Dahua, two of the world’s top manufacturers of surveillance cameras that are ultimately controlled by the Chinese Communist Party.

Both companies have been blacklisted by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission for posing a threat to American national security.

In an interim report published earlier in November, Sampson said at least 11 British police forces were using Hikvision cameras while 26 forces were using drones from DJI, a Chinese company blacklisted by the Pentagon in October for being one of the “military companies.”

A screen shows visitors being filmed by AI security cameras with facial recognition technology at the 14th China International Exhibition on Public Safety and Security at the China International Exhibition Center in Beijing on Oct. 24, 2018. Nicolas Asfouri/AFP via Getty Images

According to Conor Healy, director of government research at security and surveillance industry research group IPVM, there are “significant” risks using cameras made by Hikvision and Dahua, both having backdoors and vulnerabilities that can be used to access recordings, archives, and settings, and hack into connected secure networks.

Both firms are also known to supply surveillance equipment that has been used to target Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in China’s Xinjiang region.

The companies previously denied being complicit in the human rights abuses in Xinjiang that a number of legislatures have called “genocide,” but Healy told The Epoch Times earlier in November that while other suppliers may be able to argue they don’t know how their products are being used, it’s “not at all an exaggeration to say that Hikvision and Dahua are themselves directly responsible for the extraordinary scale of what has happened in Xinjiang.”

Citing the testimony of a former internment camp detainee, Healy said camp guards could monitor “an entire floor in these concentration camps using custom built sophisticated Hikvision technology.”

Neither companies responded to The Epoch Times’ request for comment at the time.

AI (Artificial Intelligence) security cameras with facial recognition technology are seen at the 14th China International Exhibition on Public Safety and Security at the China International Exhibition Center in Beijing on Oct. 24, 2018. Nicolas Asfouri/AFP via Getty Images

The Scottish government revealed in March in response to a freedom of information request that it had “a number of legacy items manufactured by Hikvision which are being phased out as part of an on-going security improvement programme.”

Asked whether this include any equipment made by Dahua or other Chinese manufacturers, a a spokesperson for the Scottish government told The Epoch Times in an email on Monday, “All existing CCTV kit and equipment, including Hikvision and other companies’ products, are being replaced with a new integrated system to improve and future-proof the security of the Scottish Government estate.”

There also appears to be a trend in the security industry to turn away from Hikvison.

According to The Times of London, Paul Connelly, chief executive of Connelly Security Systems, one of the biggest suppliers of alarm and CCTV equipment in Scotland, wrote to its customers last week, saying the company will source more expensive but “ethically resourced products” next year because “the Hikvision rhetoric coming out of China isn’t washing.”

CCTV direct, one of Europe’s leading CCTV and security distributors, also recommended in September training on an alternative system in anticipation of a potential ban on Hikvision and Dahua cameras.