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CONCERNS HAVE BEEN raised about the CCTV system made by a company linked to the Chinese Communist Party being used around Leinster House.
A human rights group has sent a letter this weekend to highlight qualms about the use of Hikvision surveillance cameras inside and outside the Houses of the Oireachtas in Dublin.
Hikvision has been banned in several Western jurisdictions and institutions because of security concerns. This week, Australia removed hundreds of the firm’s cameras from its defence sites due to issues relating to national security.
In November, the US government said it was banning telecommunications and video surveillance equipment from several prominent Chinese brands, including Hikvision, in an effort to protect its communications network.
Security cameras made by Hikvision were also banned from British Government buildings in November.
In a letter to the Oireachtas commission this weekend, along with the political party leaders, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) raised concerns about the Chinese Communist Party being a controlling stakeholder in Hikvision, and said its devices in Italy had sent data back to China.
“In addition to the risk that cameras inside the Oireachtas may be reporting back to China, security researchers regularly find new security vulnerabilities that allow hackers to seize full control of various types of Hikvision cameras,” the ICCL’s technology fellow, Dr Kris Shrishak, said.
“Hackers can record what the cameras see and, potentially, what they hear.
“ICCL has directly observed Hikvision cameras inside the Oireachtas Buildings and about its grounds. The cameras are positioned at locations where they can capture video of TDs, senators and staff, and their private conversations. They may also capture what was said,” he added.
The ICCL also said that Hikvision is implicated in “grave” human rights violations against Uyghur Muslims in the Chinese province of Xinjiang – claims which the company has previously denied.
The council has asked whether a security risk assessment, human rights risk assessment and data protection impact assessment were carried out on the use of Hikvision cameras, whether the assessments will be made public, and whether the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission will now “urgently” remove all Hikvision cameras and equipment.
The Journal has contacted Hikvision for comment.
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Wonder what happened to previous comments..Is it because the comments mentioned cameras in Berties office.?
If there watching the Healys raes the Chinese will give up their invasion plans straight away…..
@David cotter: They have been listening to Mick Wallace praise them for ages now. A similar scale of ‘jayses, how can you listen to the stuff he is saying?!’
@Paul Cunningham: People spying all over the place, Chinese balloons, Angela Merkel and other German government ministers who had their mobile phones tapped by U.S. intelligence. Happy days when Haughty bugged the phones of Journalists. Perhaps they don’t want us to see Ahern giving accountancy classes in his new office.
@Paul Cunningham: What has Mick Wallace said that you disagree withÇ
@Brian Smyth: It takes some brainwashing to defend everything a melt like Mick Wallace says as true. Just last weekend he has boasted about having 3 wine bars in Dublin that are undeclared under the European register of interests. You could type out essay after essay on his awful stances and bootlicking for Russia and China.
The Chinese, a great bunch of lads!
I suppose the installation went out to tender and the best ‘offer’ was accepted along with a present or two…
Or maybe, just maybe, they could get someone to patch the cameras software and remove the vulnerability which is freely available online. Does that make too much sense?
Don’t see if it is a concern if the cameras are only connected to DVR and not to cloud storage or remote viewing.
@Dave Barrett: I doubt it, if anything where to happen in the Dail and they were not connected could you imagine the repercussions
@Dave Barrett: if its an ip camera system the network for the camera could be hacked
The ICCL are a strange lot to be raising security issues . This is more like a bit of organised Sinophobia . A couple of American Generals have said that they want/expect war with China by 2025 .
Hikvision are likely the manufacturer but not the fitter like the article states. Their cameras are in almost every place that has a camera.
Install the one’s provided by uncle sam… (was deleted)..
If the Chinese were spying on Dail they would be completely confused looking at a Government that hasn’t got a clue they think that they were watching some sort of comedy show
We should purchase nothing from China. They like Putin cannot be trusted, tell lies as fast as the come into their head. I was informed recently that the Chinese Government take 25 per cent sent back to China from Chinese people working abroad. No wonder they are doing 2 and 3 jobs.
@BIG BIRD: wha? Lol you really believe that? Jeez, last month I just sent some money back for my father’s chemotherapy, nothing happened, they received full, so I wonder where you got info? Or just believe that everything suits the “story”?
@BIG BIRD:
Most of the shiz we have is made in China..
@BIG BIRD: Now where did you hear that and did you check its out? And, are you someone who falls for the anti China propaganda or are part of it?
@BIG BIRD: I take it you are not a Chinese national. It happens when Chinese nationals working abroad. Lots of them send money home to their very poor parents and the state takes 25 % I lived in an apartment in Dublin a few years ago and got to know the 6 that lived in a 2 bed apartment. One of them had 3 jobs, he got about 6 hours in bed 7days a week.
?
I love the fact the Chinese national television broadcaster is CCTV……..Probably a lucky coincidence!?!?!
The term CCTV isn’t really appropriate for a system connected to the internet and vulnerable to hackers and Chinese spying, is it.
I genuinely believe that this is part of a well orchestrated anti-China campaign. Recently at the UN, EVERY Muslim country opposed a motion to investigate the treatment of the Uighurs. EVERY one of them.
No sensitive state security equipment should be sourced from outside the EU/EEA and the UK. If a CCTV system in the Houses can be deemed “sensitive” is a different matter, the Dail and Seanad conduct their business in public as far as I know.
No irish cctv company
The faux security concerns from neo-colonial housekeepers in Lenister House about Chinese manufacturered secuirty cameras is madness – they have no basis.
Isn’t it the case that the Yanks are manufacturing outrage over a Chinese balloon – forget about the satellites in space – in order to manipulate international discourse and bolster support for its foreign policy objectives and wider, US geopolitical, imperialist interests? The Yanks are actively seeking to amplify the supposed threat of the Chinese balloon to exert pressure on its western and European allies to follow suit with anti-China objectives – hence the s***e we’re now hearing about the cameras in Lenister House. The US always exaggerates threats to shape its imperialist policy and grow its military industrial complex.
“The Journal has contacted Hikvision for comment.”
Wouldn’t the priority be to contact the Oireachtas to explain this security exposure?
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