The FCC is beginning to block gadgets with ‘foreign surveillance chips’
The FCC has exercised new authority to block electronic devices containing chips from companies deemed national security threats, specifically targeting a Huawei-linked HiVision SoC. This move aims to prevent banned components from entering the US market through third-party gadgets.
Why it matters
It represents an escalation in US-China tech trade tensions and demonstrates the government's increasing focus on supply chain security for consumer electronics.
On October 13th, Brendan Carr’s FCC gave itself a new power — it can block gadgets for containing any computer chip made by any company on its list of potential threats to national security. Today, it’s exercising that power for the first time, blocking two gadgets because they contain “foreign surveillance chips,” the FCC claims.
The agency doesn’t say which specific gadgets it blocked, and it didn’t immediately respond to our request for comment, but it does name the “surveillance chip”: it’s a HiVision Hi3516CV610 UHD Smart Vision SoC, a chip that turns a raw camera sensor into a home security camera, a dashcam, or the like. It’s often sold as a package with a Sony camera sensor and sometimes even a lens already on board, according to listings we viewed on AliExpress.
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