As if tensions could get any more on edge, today it seems that DJI has found itself blacklisted by the United States Department of Commerce, meaning it’s blocked from doing business with US-based companies! What does this break down to and mean for us? Well, American companies cannot export parts to DJI, and as a side effect of this, US-based consumers will possibly have a harder time finding and purchasing DJI Products.
[Related Reading: DJI’s Prices Are Going Up In The US Due To Trump’s Tariffs On China]
The list released by the Department of Commerce has added 78 companies (and individuals), to their block-list. DJI will be joining companies like Huawei and SMIC (China’s largest chip manufacturer)for the foreseeable future along with dozens of other Chinese based companies. And the reason for all of this? According to Reuters, “wide-scale human rights abuses within China including abusive genetic collection and analysis or high-tech surveillance” and “facilitating the export of items by China that aid repressive regimes around the world, contrary to U.S. Foreign policy interests.” This includes a report from Bloomberg stating that DJI drones are actively being used to surveil the Uyghurs in Xinjiang (A Muslim ethnic group).
[Related Reading: DJI Has Lost A Recent Patent Suit & Could Be Removed From The US Market By Summer]
While this doesn’t immediately affect American consumers, or prevent them from buying existing DJI products, companies on this list have historically found it incredibly difficult to do business in the continental USA.
According to PetaPixel, DJI has denied any requests for comments at this time, but we’ll update you should anything be reported as soon as it happens. Until then, what do you think about this situation? Do you have any DJI Products? Are you worried about them “Spying” on what you do with your drone like the Department of Justice has done? Let us know in the comments below.
2 Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Why should I worry about DJI as I have been buying and fling their drones for 10 years? What I should be worried about is the USA Department of Justice and the FBI spying on me or other American citizens. If these people who ban products or have worries knew anything about what they banned it would be different. Even the FAA has no idea what they are talking about when it comes to recreational use of drones. Somehow DJI has been linked to bad players just because they make a good product and are in China. Can someone with some common sense be put in charge, lets step back and look at each company in total. I will continue to buy DJI and dont really care if they have my information, my god man, it is flight data. It is not like our personal data is secure anymore. Why does the Government no look at United Health Care, cell phone companies, insurance companies and others that have off shore call centers that have all of our personal data.
I’ve purchased three DJI drones since 2017, most recently two months ago – Mavic 2. I am in favor of the action taken by the U.S. People somehow seemingly must have forgot that communism is not at all an acceptable form of government; to the extent that the U.S. must use the means necessary to thwart the exponentially growing threat and theft of what the Communist Chinese are on the side of perpetrating. I am not aware or convinced that my drone is actually part of sharing sensitive data directly with the Chinese Communists in Beijing, but I surely wouldn’t be surprised. I think Americans just do not think it’s likely that a government can and does have full access to all information from its people, businesses, students abroad, and so forth. So since that’s what they do – steal our stuff, take our jobs, charge us for slave labor and have no human rights or adherence to a higher calling for what it means to be a person, the least we can do is tell them and their companies to go take a hike. Sure, I’ll buy the stuff, but I am not exactly the President or the Secretary of State, they make the policies, I will and think we MUST do more. Come now, America is still a country and a radical experiment in freedom and liberty – and China is the opposite, lest we forget. So, protect it, stop their theft – I will live without a drone, cheap iPhone or a billion other things I really do not find contentment nor joy in life because it was cheap.