Treasury Adds 8 Chinese Tech Companies, Including DJI, to Investment Blacklist
The Office of Foreign Assets Control added eight Chinese technology firms to its investment blacklist, including drone maker DJI, for helping the Chinese government track and detain Muslim minorities in Xinjiang. The move, announced Dec. 16, also banned investments in Cloudwalk Technology Co., Dawning Information Industry Co., Leon Technology Company, Megvii Technology, Netposa Technologies, Xiamen Meiya Pico Information Co. and Yitu, all of which are already on the Commerce Department’s Entity List.
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The companies, which are now formally designated as having ties to the Chinese military, operate in China’s surveillance technology sector, OFAC said. The agency said DJI, the world’s largest commercial drone producer, supplies drones to the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau, which was added to the Entity List in 2019 (see 1910070076) and sanctioned by OFAC last year (see 2007090024).
Technology supplied by the companies has helped Xinjiang authorities detain more than a million Uyghurs and other members of religious minority groups in re-education centers, OFAC said. Each of the companies “actively support the biometric surveillance and tracking of ethnic and religious minorities in China” through the “installation of thousands of neighborhood police kiosks and ubiquitous placement of surveillance cameras, collection of biometric data for identification purposes, and more intrusive monitoring of internet use,” OFAC said.
The agency said CloudWalk, Megvii, Netposa and Yitu develop or supply facial recognition technology or software to Xinjiang authorities. Dawning Information Industry and Leon Technology built surveillance systems to help monitor minorities in Xinjiang, OFAC said, and Xiamen Meiya Pico developed a “transcription and translation tool” for the Uyghur language that allows Xinjiang authorities to “scan electronic devices for criminal content.”
A DJI spokesperson declined to comment. Megvii, CloudWalk, Xiamen Meiya Pico, Yitu, and NetPosa didn’t respond to requests for comment. Dawning Information Industry and Leon Technology couldn’t be reached.