An internal Huawei Group test report published Tuesday by The Washington Post proves that Huawei did work with facial recognition startup MegviiTechnology Ltd. to test an artificial intelligence camera system that can identify Uyghurs, showing that the discriminatory technology is fully standardized.
According to the Washington Post, the internal Huawei document from IPVM, a Pennsylvania company that reviews and investigates video surveillance equipment, documents that Huawei partnered with Megvii in 2018 to test an artificial intelligence camera system that scans faces, estimates each person’s age, gender, and ethnicity, and triggers a “Uyghur alert” if it detects a Uyghur face, which could alert the Chinese police.
According to the report, the test report was found on Huawei’s website, but was removed shortly after The Washington Post and IPVM asked the company for comment. However, both Huawei and Kuangtong Technology Group acknowledged that the document was authentic. Glenn Schloss, a Huawei spokesman, said that the report “is only a test and has not seen any real-world application yet. Huawei only offers generic products for such testing. We do not offer custom algorithms or applications.” A spokesperson for Megvii also said after the release that the company’s system is not designed to target or label ethnic groups.
The report comments that while such race-detecting software is banned in the U.S., systematic identification software that can identify facial features in practice is becoming increasingly popular, and there are concerns that discriminatory technology from China will become increasingly popular.
Last November, Hikvision Group, one of the world’s largest video surveillance equipment makers, was also accused of selling surveillance equipment that could automatically identify Uyghurs, and after the video surveillance research firm IPVM questioned Hikvision, Hikvision removed the product page in question.
Hikvision was blacklisted in the United States last year for allegedly helping Beijing crack down on Muslims in Xinjiang by providing surveillance equipment to police departments in the region. The company has denied any wrongdoing.
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