‘Skin Color Analytics’ surveillance cameras in China are a source of concern

According to a study by the IPVM (Internet Protocol Video Market), a US-based security and surveillance industry research firm, as published by Voice of America, Dahua, a Chinese manufacturer of surveillance equipment, is selling cameras in Europe with what it calls a “skin colour analytics” capability.

 

According to the IPVM report from July 31 that VOA Mandarin was able to receive, “The company defended the analytics as being a ‘basic feature of a smart security solution.'”

 

The United States of America’s state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster, VoA, creates digital, TV, and radio material that is distributed all over the globe.

 

According to IPVM and the Los Angeles Times, Dahua gave the Chinese police a video surveillance system with “real-time Uyghur warnings” in February 2021. These warnings included information on a person’s eyebrow size, skin tone, and ethnicity.

 

According to IPVM’s 2018 statistics report, contracts worth USD $1 billion have been awarded to Dahua and another Chinese video surveillance firm, Hikvision, since 2016 by the government of China’s Xinjiang region, which is home to the Uyghur community.

 

According to the study, “skin color/complexion” is one of the “human body characteristics” included in Dahua’s ICC Open Platform Handbook. The “skin color types” that Dahua analytic tools would target include “yellow,” “black,” and “white,” according to the company’s “data dictionary.” This was confirmed by VOA Mandarin on Dahua’s Chinese website, according to VOA.

 

Skin color detection, a capability Dahua promotes as part of their Smart Office Park solution aimed at providing security for major corporate campuses in China, is also included in the IPVM study under the “Personnel Control” category.

 

According to Charles Rollet, a co-author of the IPVM research, “basically what these video analytics do is that, if you turn them on, then the camera will automatically try and determine the skin colour of whoever passes, whoever it captures in the video footage,” VOA said.

 

So, he said, “that means the camera is going to be guessing or trying to figure out whether the person in front of it… has black, white, or yellow, in their words, skin color.”

 

According to the IPVM research, Dahua sells cameras equipped with the skin color analytics capability in three European countries. Germany, France, and the Netherlands have all experienced racial strife in the recent past.

 

According to Dahua, the capacity to analyze skin tones is a crucial component of surveillance technology.

 

“The platform in question is entirely consistent with our commitments to not build solutions that target any single racial, ethnic, or national group,” Dahua stated in a statement to IPVM. One fundamental component of a smart security system is the capability to broadly detect visible traits like height, weight, hair and eye color, and broad categories of skin color.

 

According to IPMV, the business has previously denied providing the aforementioned capability, and color detection is not often seen in popular camera technology solutions.

 

There has been debate regarding mistakes caused by skin tone in surveillance systems for face recognition for a long time in several Western countries. The identification of skin tone in surveillance applications presents issues with civil and human rights.

 

As a result, Rollet added, “it’s unusual to see it for skin color because it’s such a contentious and ethically fraught field.”

 

According to Human Rights Watch (HRW) technology manager Anna Bacciarelli, Dahua technology shouldn’t include skin tone analyses.

 

“All companies have a responsibility to respect human rights, and take steps to prevent or mitigate any human rights risks that may arise as a result of their actions,” she said in the email.

 

According to her, “skin tone analytics-based surveillance software poses a significant risk to the right to equality and non-discrimination, by allowing camera owners and operators to racially profile people at scale — probably without their knowledge, infringing privacy rights — and should simply not be created or sold in the first place.”

 

The claim that Dahua’s surveillance devices are designed to make racial identification possible was refuted. Contrary to claims made by certain media sources, Dahua Technology has not and will never create solutions aimed at any one ethnic group, according to the website of its US-based firm.

 

The Chinese technology firms Dahua and Hikvision, which have strong links to Beijing, were found to be a danger to US national security in 2022 by the US Federal Communications Commission.

 

The European Union adopted an amendment proposal on June 14 for its draft Artificial Intelligence Law, which is a step toward outlawing the use of face recognition technology altogether in public areas.Svenja Hahn, a German member of the European Parliament and leader of the Renew Europe Group, told Politico that face recognition technology “has no place in a liberal democracy” since it has been used for widespread surveillance in China.

 

The US government has long outlawed racial discrimination against consumers in industries like banking and healthcare. Law enforcement alone is allowed to use the face recognition systems offered by IBM, Google, and Microsoft.

 

According to Rollet, “If the camera is filming at night or if there are shadows, it can misclassify people.”Caitlin Chin studies technology regulation both domestically and overseas as a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

 

Accordingly, she told VOA, “this is something that’s both very dehumanizing and very concerning from a human rights perspective, in part because any errors in the technology could result in false arrests and discrimination, but also because the ability to sort people by skin color on its own almost inevitably results in people being discriminated against.”