Crawley Camera Club: 17th September 2023 - Part 2: Ifield Drive

Thanks to Wewillnotfail for the tip
The amount of surveillance equipment at the one site on Ifield Drive is mind boggling I counted 20 items), as is the cost at over £200,000. Why so many and why there? Why install cameras that are run by AI, and can tell the difference between adults and children? And why Hikvision, given all the security concerns associated with that company?

Oh good. Got to have that 'New integrated appearance....'
"New integrated appearance
Heat mapping, Queue Management, People Counting
4 built-in microphones provide better audio"
https://www.hikvision.com/uk/

There appear to be a ridiculous number of products, although some of them are unavailable:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=hikvision&page=12&ref=sr_pg_11

"IT IS A Chinese state-owned company that is implicated in disturbing human rights violations. But that has not stopped Hikvision from gaining a major foothold in the United Kingdom. Through a network of corporate partners, the Hangzhou-based security firm has supplied its surveillance cameras for use on the British parliamentary estate, as well as to police, hospitals, schools, and universities throughout the country, according to sources and procurement records.
Hikvision, whose technology the U.S. government recently banned federal agencies from purchasing, is generating millions of dollars in annual revenue selling its technology to British companies and organizations. At the same time, it has been helping to establish an oppressive surveillance state in the Xinjiang region of China, where the Uighur ethnic minorities have been held in secret internment camps.
https://theintercept.com/2019/04/09/hikvision-cameras-uk-parliament/

"Mon 21 Sep 2020
Surveillance cameras made by Hikvision, the Chinese company that has been implicated in grave human rights violations and has been blacklisted by the US government, are being used across the UK, from leisure centres in London to school toilets in west Norfolk."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/21/chinese-spy-tech-firm-linked-uighur-abuses-increases-uk-presence

That famous Benjamin Franklin quote:
“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety”
https://www.hoover.org/research/what-benjamin-franklin-really-said

And ironically...
https://www.npr.org/2015/03/02/390245038/ben-franklins-famous-liberty-safety-quote-lost-its-context-in-21st-century