Equipment authorization has been withheld from a dashboard camera and a wireless video transmitter by the Federal Communications Commission, after each turned out to carry a processor from HiSilicon, Huawei’s chip design arm. The agency announced the action on Oct 22.
It is the first enforcement of component rules that took effect on Oct 13, which extend the Covered List beyond finished products made by barred companies to gear carrying their logic-bearing chips. Until now, a device assembled by an unrelated firm could be approved even if its silicon came from a listed supplier.
The commission named neither brand nor model. Under the rule, applicants attest that a device holds no covered component, and the FCC did not say whether these applicants disclosed the chip or whether inspectors spotted it.
HiSilicon is not itself listed. Huawei has been on the Covered List since March 2021, and a footnote extends every entry to subsidiaries and affiliates. The FCC cited HiSilicon’s own marketing for the Hi3516CV610 smart vision system on chip, which the company describes as designed for the surveillance market with built-in face detection.
Chairman Brendan Carr described video gear built around such parts as a plain and unacceptable danger. Neither device had been authorized for sale, and the order runs forward only, so products approved before the deadline keep their authorizations.
Paperwork rather than inspection is what the rule leans on, and the FCC has asked in a further notice whether every application should carry a hardware and software bill of materials. That change would put a chip list directly in the filing.
