After Ian Lahiffe returned to Beijing, he found a camera mounted on the wall outside his apartment door. After a trip to southern China, the 34-year-old Irishman and his family were quarantined at home for two weeks, a mandatory measure imposed by the Beijing government to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus.
He said he opened the door as the camera was being installed, without warning. “This is an incredible invasion of privacy,” Lahiffe said. “It just seems like a massive data grab. And I don’t know how much of it is actually legal.”
Although there is no official announcement stating that cameras must be placed outside the homes of people under quarantine, this has been happening in some cities across China since at least February, according to three people who reported their experience with the cameras to CNN, as well as social media posts and government statements.
China currently has no specific national law regulating the use of surveillance cameras, but the devices are already a regular part of public life: they often monitor people crossing streets, entering a shopping mall, dining in a restaurant, or boarding a bus.
More than 20 million cameras had been installed across China as of 2017, according to state broadcaster CCTV. But other sources suggest a much higher number. According to a report by IHS Markit Technology, now part of Informa Tech, China had installed 349 million surveillance cameras as of 2018, nearly five times the number of cameras in the United States.
But now the pandemic has brought surveillance cameras closer to people's private lives: from public spaces in the city to the doors of their homes – and in some rare cases, surveillance cameras even inside apartments.
Tactical evolution
China already uses a digital “health code” system to track people’s movements and decide who should be quarantined. To enforce home quarantine, local authorities have again turned to technology – and have been open about using surveillance cameras.
A regional government office in Nanjing, in eastern Jiangsu province, said it had installed cameras outside the doors of people in self-quarantine to monitor them 24 hours a day — a move that “helped save personnel costs and increase efficiency ,” according to its Feb. 16 post on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like platform.
In Hebei province, the Wuchongan county government in Qianan city also said it was using surveillance cameras to monitor residents quarantined at home, according to a statement on website .
In the eastern city of Hangzhou, China Unicom, a state-owned telecommunications company, has helped local governments install 238 cameras to monitor residents under quarantine since February 8, the company said in a post on Weibo.
On Weibo, some people posted photos of cameras they said had recently been placed outside their doorsas they went into home quarantine – in Beijing, Shenzhen, Nanjing and Changzhou, among other cities.
Some appeared to accept the surveillance, although it remains unclear how much criticism of the measure is tolerated on the country’s censored and monitored internet . A Weibo user, who was quarantined at home after returning to Beijing from Hubei province, said he had been informed in advance by his neighbor that a camera had been installed at his home. “I fully respect and understand the installation of the camera,” he wrote in his post.
Another Beijing resident said he didn't think the camera was necessary, "but since it's a formal requirement, I'll accept it," wrote Tian Zengjun, a lawyer in Beijing.
Others, concerned about the spread of the virus in their communities, called on local authorities to install surveillance cameras to ensure people are adhering to quarantine rules.
Jason Lau, a privacy expert and professor at Hong Kong Baptist University, said people across China had become accustomed to pervasive surveillance long before the coronavirus.
Cameras inside homes
Some people say that cameras have even been placed inside their homes.
William Zhou, a civil servant, returned to the city of Changzhou, in eastern Jiangsu province, from his hometown in Anhui province in late February. The next day, he said, a community worker and a police officer came to his apartment and set up a camera pointing at his front door — from a closet inside his home.
Zhou said he didn’t like the idea. He asked the community worker what the camera would record, and the community worker showed him the footage on smartphone . Zhou was furious and asked why the camera couldn’t be placed outside, but the police officer told him it could be vandalized. In the end, he said the camera stayed in the closet despite his strong protests .
That afternoon, Zhou said he called the mayor’s hotline and the local epidemic control command center to complain. Two days later, two local government officials showed up at his door, asking him to understand and cooperate with the government’s epidemic control efforts. They also told him that the camera would only take “still images” when his door was moved and would not record video or audio.
Zhou said he would be fine with placing the camera outside his front door, because he wouldn't open the door anyway. "Installing it in my house is a huge invasion of my privacy," he said.
Zhou said two other residents who were quarantined in his apartment complex told him they also had cameras installed inside their homes.
The region's epidemic control command center confirms the use of cameras to enforce home quarantine, but does not provide further details.
How do cameras work?
There is no official figure on the number of cameras installed to enforce home quarantine across China. However, the Chaoyang regional government in Jilin, a city of four million people, said it had installed 500 cameras as of February 8.
Around the world, governments have adopted less intrusive technologies to monitor whether a person leaves their apartment. In Hong Kong, for example, all international arrivals are subject to a two-week home quarantine and must wear an electronic bracelet, which is linked to a smartphone app that alerts authorities if they leave their apartments or hotel rooms. South Korea uses an app that tracks their location with GPS and sends notifications when people leave quarantine. Last month, Poland launched an app that allows people in quarantine to send selfies to let authorities know they are staying home.
Even in Beijing, not everyone under quarantine has a camera outside their home. Two residents who recently returned to the city of Wuhan said they had magnetic alarms on their apartment doors, which would alert community workers if they went outside.
The legal side
China currently has no specific national law regulating the use of surveillance cameras in public places. The Ministry of Public Security published a draft regulation on security cameras in 2016, but the decree is awaiting approval by the country's national legislature . In recent years, some local governments have issued their own regulations on cameras.
Tong Zongjin, a Beijing-based lawyer, said that installing cameras outside a person's front door has always been in a legal gray area.
Adding to the complexity of the problem is that these cameras have been installed by authorities during a public health emergency for epidemic control purposes, so an individual's privacy must be balanced against the public interest and safety, Tong said.
On February 4, the Cyberspace Administration of China issued a directive, calling on regional cyber authorities to “actively use big data, including personal information, to support epidemic prevention and control,” while protecting people’s personal information.
The directive prohibits the collection of personal data for epidemic control without the consent of organizations that have not received approval from health authorities under China's Cabinet.
It also said that the collection of personal information should be limited to “key groups” such as confirmed or suspected Covid-19 patients and their close contacts , and that the information collected should not be used for other purposes or made public without consent. Organizations that collect personal information must adopt strict measures to protect data from theft or leaks, the document said.
A new era of digital surveillance?
Earlier this month, over 100 rights and privacy organizations around the world issued a joint statement to call on governments to ensure that the use of digital technologies to track and monitor citizens during the pandemic is carried out in accordance with human rights.
