UK surveillance cameras regulator withdraws from industry conference over Hikvision’s involvement

Name: US blacklists 28 Chinese entities over Xinjiang
Uploaded: 2022-03-22T10:37:49.000Z
Duration: 1 min 22 s
Description: US blacklists 28 Chinese entities over Xinjiang

Fraser Sampson, commissioner for biometrics and surveillance cameras, says Hikvision has not yet answered questions over Xinjiang

Sampson had been set to speak at the CCTV User Group’s Vision 2022 conference in April

Reading Time:3 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

Surveillance cameras manufactured by Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology near the company’s headquarters in Hangzhou. Photo: Bloomberg

Chad Bray

Published: 6:37pm, 22 Mar 2022

The regulator overseeing the United Kingdom’s closed circuit television (CCTV) industry has pulled out of an influential conference over the involvement of China’s Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology.

Fraser Sampson, Britain’s commissioner for biometrics and surveillance cameras, said Hikvision had yet to answer his questions about human rights abuses in Xinjiang first put to the surveillance camera maker last year, prompting his withdrawal.

State-backed Hikvision is a prominent sponsor of CCTV User Group’s Vision 2022 conference, which is expected to take place next month in the village of Whittlebury in Northamptonshire county.

“I asked several questions of Hikvision, one being simply whether they accepted that such atrocities were taking place,” Sampson said. “They have still not answered those questions.”

01:22

US blacklists 28 Chinese entities over Xinjiang

Hikvision was blacklisted by the US government in 2019 over Beijing’s treatment of Uygur Muslims and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. The Hangzhou-based company generates about a quarter of its revenue overseas, with more than 1.3 million of its security cameras in use in Britain alone.