Houston, like many other cities across the country, has a system of surveillance cameras. But new reporting shows many cities may have cameras connected to the Chinese government.
The Wall Street Journal says the company responsible for these cameras is Hikvision, which is 42% owned by the Chinese government. They are in major cities and even some military bases. Rick Stoll is a political scientist at Rice that specializes in international affairs and says there is a degree of risk to this.
“Take a close look at these cameras and see if it’s possible that they can transmit back to someplace else just to make sure there’s nothing funky going on,” Stoll explained.
So why was this company chosen to supply cameras over others?
“They did not realize the company was partially owned by the Chinese government and they simply went with the cheaper price,” Stoll said.
We checked into it, and we could not confirm that the City of Houston uses the Hikvision cameras. But at the Super Bowl in February, a system from Axis Communications was used to help monitor the events downtown. That company is from Sweden.