西方制裁影响中国监控 '天网' 部署

choi

(1) 美中贸易战及西方制裁影响中国监控 '天网' 部署. VOA Chinese, Sept 24, 2018
https://www.voachinese.com/a/new ... 180924/4584640.html
("据报道")

Note: The report does not mention SCMP by name, source of this Chinese-language report.

(2) Stephen Chen, How tensions with the West are putting the future of China's Skynet mass surveillance system at stake. South China Morning Post, Sept 23, 2018
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/ ... -chinas-skynet-mass

Quote:

"Skynet, as China's national security network is known, had 170 million cameras last year and Beijing plans to have another 400 million units installed across the country by 2020.

"The small [imported] tube device inside the camera that makes this possible generates a powerful laser beam every trillionth of a second. * * * The best domestic device generates a billion beams per second [for 'illumination'], a thousand times slower than those from the West.  The inferior hardware severely affects the distance and clarity of a target

"Last week several [Chinese] government researchers confirmed that the US and some European countries [by not issuing export license] had stopped shipping these components to China and national security authorities were deeply concerned.

" 'They [the company] can't even send a shipment to Hong Kong any more,' which was 'almost unprecedented' as Hong Kong had long served as a reliable proxy for sensitive surveillance equipment and technology sold to the mainland, the researcher said. * * * 'The West is forming a united front [against China],' said a senior engineer involved in the Skynet programme." (brackets original).

"There are other components, such as graphic processing chips used in the security cameras, that are not yet banned for sale to China, but soon may be. Most of the chips are imported from the US, which still allows them to be exported to China.  However, in addition to the mounting trade war, there is also pressure internationally for action in response to reports that up to 1 million Uygur Muslims are being held in detention centres in Xinjiang in the country's far west.

"An official from the US State Department said the United States was 'deeply troubled by the Chinese government's worsening crackdown on Uygurs, Kazakhs, and other Muslim members of minority groups in Xinjiang.' * * * 'We will continue to consult with the Department of Treasury on potential export controls on items that can be misused by Chinese security officials in Xinjiang, and controls on Chinese entities that act in a manner inconsistent with US foreign policy, in order to ensure that US companies are not complicit in these abuses.'  The Chinese foreign ministry declined to comment.

"A group of US lawmakers led by Senator Marco Rubio and representative Chris Smith has urged the administration of US President Donald Trump to “swiftly act” to sanction Chinese companies supplying hardware to the Xinjiang surveillance programme.  In a joint letter to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin on August 28, Rubio and Smith * * *

"Stocks of major surveillance equipment suppliers to the Chinese government have already tumbled since the start of the trade war earlier this year.  Hikvision, the world's largest video surveillance company, based in Hangzhou, [has dropped ~7-% since March this year] * * * Investors are worried the company could become another ZTE

"Hikvision 海康威视, Dahua 大华 and Uniview Technologies 宇视科技 [all three based in Hangzhou], the third-largest global player and also Chinese, between them scoop nearly a third of video surveillance revenues in the world, according to an IFSEC Global report in March. * * * China is expected to buy US$20 billion worth of CCTV cameras and related equipment this year, nearly half the size of the global market. * * * A company spokeswoman said many CCTV cameras sold in the West were developed, designed and made in China. Some Western security companies stuck a label on the products, but they ran AI codes written by Chinese software engineers, she said.

"Li Guoping, deputy director of the Nanjing Institute of Astronomical Optics and Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Jiangsu, said Western sanctions on imaging chips could have severe consequences.  For instance, the US embargo on advanced infrared sensors had forced China to give up on numerous branches of astronomy research.

Note:
(a) This is a lengthy report.
(b) Security Camera: Illumination and Artificial Lighting. Unifore, undated
https://www.unifore.net/analog-s ... icial-lighting.html
("When security camera works in complete darkness environment (0 Lux), the camera image sensor will not be able to capture images. In this condition, the cameras have artificial lighting system such as infrared [IR] LEDs, white light LEDs, as well as laser emitters [wavelength 808nm, compared with visible light 390-700nm; can illuminate at light]. These artificial lighting systems can help camera to capture clear monochrome or color images in low illumination or zero illumination environments. Recently, Hikvision and Sony launched day & night security cameras which utilize dual-lighting system [ie, white light and/or IR]")

This Web page says the range/distance for IR, white light and laser emitter (in these cameras) are 200m, 50m and 3km, respectively.

Based in Shenzhen, Unifore sells equipment. I do not know the relationship between Hikvision and Unifore: subsidiary or independent.