"Made in US" camera really Made in China sold to US Gov't

TL1096r

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A lot more to the story than the title. Interesting read:

 

c hris527

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Nice presser for the suits talking about holes in national security. I do not want to downplay this event but I know where there is a WAY bigger hole in National security and its Way south of the southern district of New York.
 

alastairstevenson

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This is quite a big story.
We can speculate which manufacturer(s) were implicated, probably will be confirmed as other media picks up on it.
 

TL1096r

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Hikvision was Aventura's largest supplier / partner. We detailed this here US Issues Criminal Charges For Fraudulently Selling Hikvision And Other China Products
Great write-up. I always thought people knew it was rebranded China Cams. Or did they just not care as long as it worked and said otherwise? I feel there should be more investigating that shows others buying it knew it was not 100% made in the US.

Didn't someone say they had Aventura setup their cams and they knew right away it was a China camera/firmware.

The honeywell was very obvious it was rebranded. Did they really try to hide this?
 

john-ipvm

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I always thought people knew it was rebranded China Cams.
That's the wild aspect of all this. On the one hand, lots of people in the industry and those who had technical experience knew this. But, on the other hand, the 'leaders' of the industry would not talk about it and most enterprise buyers do not have enough hands-on comparative experience to really know what's what. The result was that while a minority of people knew it was obvious, most did not. This is changing, we have been publishing our OEM directories the past few years, the US government is now stepping up enforcement, etc.

And for Honeywell, yes, they really tried to hide this. They never disclosed anything and still have not on their website on Dahua OEMed devices, even with the government ban now law. And when Honeywell's field people were pushed about why their products looked identical to Dahua, they would talk about custom firmware or custom designs, etc.

To get a sense of how institutional this became, we asked the US Security Industry Association (SIA) last year the following question repeatedly:

> In SIA's expert opinion, if a product is produced in China but then an American company applies their label and their colors to the UI of a product, does SIA consider that product still produced in China or produced in America?

They refused to answer it - SIA Plays Dumb On OEMs And Hikua Ban
 

TL1096r

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That's the wild aspect of all this. On the one hand, lots of people in the industry and those who had technical experience knew this. But, on the other hand, the 'leaders' of the industry would not talk about it and most enterprise buyers do not have enough hands-on comparative experience to really know what's what. The result was that while a minority of people knew it was obvious, most did not. This is changing, we have been publishing our OEM directories the past few years, the US government is now stepping up enforcement, etc.

And for Honeywell, yes, they really tried to hide this. They never disclosed anything and still have not on their website on Dahua OEMed devices, even with the government ban now law. And when Honeywell's field people were pushed about why their products looked identical to Dahua, they would talk about custom firmware or custom designs, etc.

To get a sense of how institutional this became, we asked the US Security Industry Association (SIA) last year the following question repeatedly:

> In SIA's expert opinion, if a product is produced in China but then an American company applies their label and their colors to the UI of a product, does SIA consider that product still produced in China or produced in America?

They refused to answer it - SIA Plays Dumb On OEMs And Hikua Ban
All very interesting. I have no idea about any of this so I was just wondering. Thanks for answering.

That Auto maintain you show on site that has Auto Reboot - what is the point of that? Both my PTZ had it as default and was driving me crazy when it would reset until I found out about this feature a few weeks ago.
 

EMPIRETECANDY

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Nice presser for the suits talking about holes in national security. I do not want to downplay this event but I know where there is a WAY bigger hole in National security and its Way south of the southern district of New York.
They will install new cams soon, who will pay this money? And right now very seldom manufacturers make cams locally. 90% are all from China. Price will be extremely expensive. Lastly Tax payers will pay for this. Things are hard to explain, Chinese gov/military all use Windows from Microsoft.
 

gpower07

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They will install new cams soon, who will pay this money? And right now very seldom manufacturers make cams locally. 90% are all from China. Price will be extremely expensive. Lastly Tax payers will pay for this. Things are hard to explain, Chinese gov/military all use Windows from Microsoft.
chinese military has its own OS(linux). that's what i heard.
 

john-ipvm

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Price will be extremely expensive. Lastly Tax payers will pay for this
Compared to what you sell Dahua cameras at, sure, it will be expensive. But for government and enterprise users, there's lots of other costs that in total eclipse camera pricing. In big facilities, the infrastructure to run cable, mounts, network, etc. can be thousands per camera (think cameras on roofs or outside walls or large buildings, etc.). And these facilities value software capabilities beyond what is available in NVRs. Plus, high-end Avigilon and Axis cameras are generally better than Dahua and Hikvision. They are generally not worth the premium for DIY or homes systems but they often are in government and enterprise ones.

Things are hard to explain, Chinese gov/military all use Windows from Microsoft.
I am genuinely curious here. In your experience, what percentage pay Microsoft for legitimate / licenses versions of Windows vs pirate / steal it? e.g. China, Addicted to Bootleg Software, Reels From Ransomware Attack
 

john-ipvm

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Auto Reboot - what is the point of that?
Frequently auto reboot is used to deal with memory leaks or other software issues that can be mitigated by regular rebooting. It is not a good practice and is not done in most IP cameras.
 

TL1096r

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Frequently auto reboot is used to deal with memory leaks or other software issues that can be mitigated by regular rebooting. It is not a good practice and is not done in most IP cameras.
Thank you

My dahua cams came with auto-restart and was highly annoying thinking there was an issue with cam. After about 3rd week of seeing it rest at same time I was able to figure out it was an auto-reboot setting I never enabled.
 

john-ipvm

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are there "any" cameras "Made in the USA".
Avigilon is made in Canada and the USA.
Axis is made in Thailand, Mexico, Eastern Europe, etc.
Vivotek and their ODMs Meraka and Verkada are made in Taiwan.
None of these are going to be popular in the DIY and residential market but these companies are significant players in commercial, Avigilon and Axis in particular is much bigger in the US high-end market that Dahua and Hikvision, etc.
 

TL1096r

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Avigilon is made in Canada and the USA.
Axis is made in Thailand, Mexico, Eastern Europe, etc.
Vivotek and their ODMs Meraka and Verkada are made in Taiwan.
None of these are going to be popular in the DIY and residential market but these companies are significant players in commercial, Avigilon and Axis in particular is much bigger in the US high-end market that Dahua and Hikvision, etc.
How does pricing and specs compare. Do you receive the same specs for the same price we buy the Dahua? I think that is a big factor in having US cams being popular. I feel the last thing people think about is security.
 

john-ipvm

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Do you receive the same specs for the same price we buy the Dahua?
Dahua pricing, especially buying it straight for China is going to be radically less than what people pay for Axis and Avigilon. Commercial buyers generally though, even when they buy Dahua or Hikvision, buy US versions since they value the support, warranty, local salespeople, etc.

Avigilon, as an example, is better in analytics, better in image quality, better in VMS than Dahua / Hikvision but it's way more expensive. So Avigilon is generally overkill for a home or DIY project but Dahua and Hikvision are generally insufficient for a corporation or high-security facility.
 

bigredfish

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Middle of the road 1-2MP Axis cameras are in my expeience 3X-5X more expensive then the Dahua gear we are buying for $150-$250.
The five Axis 2MP cameras sold to my HOA before I got on the Board were $800 ea and vastly inferior to the 2MP Starlight Dahua 5231 series cameras
 

john-ipvm

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Middle of the road 1-2MP Axis cameras are in my expeience 3X-5X more expensive then the Dahua gear we are buying for $150-$250.
The five Axis 2MP cameras sold to my HOA before I got on the Board were $800 ea and vastly inferior to the 2MP Starlight Dahua 5231 series cameras
Those things sound roughly right to me. One thing to keep in mind is that imaging technology has improved significantly over the last 5 years so really high end things from just a short time ago will easily be beat by most new things.

Also, Axis tends to be more price competitive for their high-end motorized P / Q units but still going to be way more than what you buy from Andy, etc. But even the same Dahua bought from ADI are notably more expensive than Andy...
 

bigredfish

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True and these were a few years back .. 1365mkii's and 1364s.... theyre sitting in my garage if anyone wants to buy them for $75 ea. They were $800 ea to us so I assume about $600 ea to the contractor.. No IR..
 

gpower07

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Middle of the road 1-2MP Axis cameras are in my expeience 3X-5X more expensive then the Dahua gear we are buying for $150-$250.
The five Axis 2MP cameras sold to my HOA before I got on the Board were $800 ea and vastly inferior to the 2MP Starlight Dahua 5231 series cameras
I have couple 1,2,3 mp laying around. I love axis warranty. but their price.
 
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