The Federal Communications Commission has issued a ban on two devices containing the Hi3516CV610 UHD Smart Vision SoC. This action marks the first time the regulator has applied its new chip-level rule to restrict hardware imports based on the origin of specific components.
The Hi3516CV610 is designed for surveillance equipment, including dashcams and wireless CCTV systems. It integrates an Arm Cortex-A7 processor, WiFi, Ethernet, and a dedicated Neural Processing Unit. The NPU supports multimodal large models and transformer feature acceleration for object recognition.
The FCC identified the SoC as containing logic-bearing components produced by entities included on the Covered List. The regulator expressed concerns that the AI capabilities, specifically face detection and tracking, could be utilized for unauthorized surveillance of US citizens.
This decision follows previous regulatory actions against Huawei regarding the production of AI chips. The FCC cited concerns over the use of shell companies to bypass supply restrictions and the broader history of security-related product bans involving the manufacturer.
