"Fear Mongering": Hikvision USA Cybersecurity Director Dismisses PRC Government Ownership Concerns
By John Honovich, Published Feb 16, 2018, 08:28am ESTThe facts are:
- The PRC government created Hikvision and is Hikvision's controlling shareholder.
- Hikvision's Chairman, a Communist Party Secretary, has pledged allegiance to the China Communist Party.
- Hikvision's VP of R&D simultaneously works for the ORC government.
- China has a history of cyber attacks against the USA.
- China exerts authoritarian control of their country and people.
Despite that, in SP&T News, Hikvision USA Cybersecurity Director Chuck Davis simply dismisses concerns as fearmongering:
Unfortunately, for Davis and SP&T, Hikvision's own financials reveal the deception of that claim. It is not simply 'state-owned enterprises' owning stock, it is a CETHIK, a division created by the PRC government to control Hikvision:
While Davis is an expert in cybersecurity, rather than politics and economics, he surely is smart enough to read through those primary documents to understand the truth about Hikvision's ownership and control.
Of course, he is in a difficult position. For him to continue being paid, he has to follow the party line (pun intended).
And cybersecurity is not simply about technical flaws, it is about countries adversarial to one's own exploiting systems (e.g., of companies they control) for geopolitical advantage. Just this week, The FBI, CIA and NSA say American citizens shouldn't use Huawei phones. And Huawei's PRC government 'connections' are far less clear and definitive than Hikvision's.
Davis will continue his public relations tour and he should speak about and be questioned on Hikvision's PRC government control. We encourage Davis to face these facts.
4 reports cite this report:
Comments (25)

02/16/18 05:36pm
Actual snapshot of Hickvision making their PR plans to address their network security.
Last line from Chuck in that piece is illuminating RE: his understanding of priorities
subheader: Never bite the hand that feeds you.
"I’m here to support the sales team, said Davis, but my goal here is to create good, secure products and make people aware."
Guru Davis speciously says
Perhaps most importantly for installers, according to Davis: “Putting a camera directly on the Internet is not a good idea. I don’t care whose camera it is.”
But what about NVR’s? Are they Ok? Are they really any different from a network perspective?
It´s not Hikvision but the same issue according "security":
Don’t use Huawei phones, say heads of FBI, CIA, and NSA
Page 212
2018_IP_Networking Book by IPVM
"Because of these reasons, manual port forwarding has proven more
reliable in commercial surveillance, with UPnP typically left to consumer
use."
If government security agencies are advising citizens against using Huawei phones due to security concerns, should they also be looking into the fact that HiSilicon, the chip vendor that makes almost all of the processors in the current IP camera and NVR/DVR market from China, is also owned by Huawei?
I know which PSA TEC session I will be attending.
I feel this is a case of allowing your pay to determine your ethics.