EPIC Urges US to Stop Surveillance Tech Exports

Photo by Xacobe de Toro


Text Source EPIC newsletter

In a letter addressed to the Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez, EPIC urged the Department of Commerce to restrict the export of high-tech surveillance equipment to China. While the US has restricted the export of products such as tear gas, handcuffs, and shotguns to China, the letter noted, high-tech equipment that can be used for surveillance and censorship is freely exported to the country.


The export restrictions were put in place following the 1989 Tienanmen Square massacre. Recent reports on human rights abuses in China have focused on the role that US technology companies have played in the suppression of free speech. A recent article in BusinessWeek, for example, highlighted the fact that Oracle, Cisco, Motorola, and EMC Corp. all sold technology products to Chinese police and security authorities that can be used to track political dissidents, in spite of China's "dismal" human rights record.