Firm has sold gear to repressive regimes

idea since experts say they are very difficult to find and besides, there are often software updates.’ Beijing helped build the new African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – then all the body’s data was reportedly downloaded in the middle of every night for five years until the hacking was discovered.

‘When security devices are all connected to the internet, the potential for data to be fed to unauthorised sources is huge,’ said Silkie Carlo, director of the Big Brother Watch pressure group.

Hikvision, which also sells robots and devices such as jammers to ‘capture’ hostile drones, has sold security equipment to some of the most repressive regimes on the planet, including Iran, North Korea and Saudi Arabia.

Last October, Washington placed

Hikvision and 19 other Chinese technology firms on its ‘entities’ list for links to human- rights atrocities, which meant US firms were not permitted to sell them vital components.

Huawei was similarly listed six months earlier.

A New York firm and its executives were charged later over allegations of importing Hikvision surveillance gear that was sold on as ‘American-made’, even ending up on navy ships and military bases. The Department of Justice claimed the systems had ‘known cybersecurity vulnerability’.

Yet Britain is so unconcerned that the Home Office even allowed Hikvision to attend its Security and Policing trade fair in Farnborough in March.

‘It is shocking the British Government permits the purchase of more than one million surveillance cameras made by a Chinese

Communist Party-controlled company and installed across the country,’ said Alex Gladstein of the Human Rights Foundation.

Beijing newspapers admit their firms must mine global data to improve ‘ deep learning’ recognition of different ethnicities. Xi Jinping, China’s hardline president, wants his country to become the global leader in developing artificial intelligence technologies by 2030, using big data to strengthen the state’s domination of citizens.

Using a process called machine learning, huge quantities of data are fed into computer systems so they learn to recognise patterns or traits. The more access they have to diverse data, the smarter the algorithms they can develop.

Some analysts have compared this battle to the space race between America and Russia in the 1960s – although Beijing has been ramping up spending in this area much faster than Washington has.

China sees this transformative technology as being used in everyt hing f rom guiding weapons and assisting medical diagnosis through to ‘ predictive policing’ – and hopes its systems, once perfected, can be sold to similarminded autocracies.

Lianchao Han, a leading Chinese dissident, said Hikvision was selling cut- price products for spying on people and supporting dictatorships.

‘If we cannot stop this surveillance company, it will mean the end of the free world as we know it,’ he said.

Hikvision said t hat it t ook reports of human rights ‘ very seriously’, engaged with both British and US governments to address any concerns and that its cybersecurity standards were compliant ‘ with the most rigorous certifications’.

‘The most recent claims by the US government about links to the Chinese military are completely baseless and are the consequence of a global trade war with China,’ said a spokesman.

‘We will continue to work with all stakeholders in a transpare n t manner to resolve all of these matters.’