Taipei City council has come under fire after admitting that a robot dog it bought to help patrol city streets using surveillance cameras was made by a Chinese companylinked to the Chinese military.
Hammer Lee, the deputy mayor of Taiwan’s capital, introduced a “new patrol partner” for the management and repair of pedestrian areas in a post on Facebook on Tuesday.
“This robot, equipped with an optical panoramic survey system, can create 360-degree images, accurately locate facilities, and even automatically report missing items,” Lee said, noting its ability to “accumulate comprehensive data”.
On Wednesday, an opposition councillor, Chien Shu-pei, said she had learned that the robot had been made by Unitree, a fast-growing robotics startup based in the Chinese city of Hangzhou.
Unitree’s humanoid robots have appeared in the official lunar new year gala and at the recent humanoid robot games in Beijing, and its founder and CEO, Xingxing Wang, has met China’s leader, Xi Jinping.
Earlier this year a US congressional committee said Unitree’s robots were “dual use” tech, marketed as civilian but also used in Chinese military drills and police operations.
Chien said the council’s procurement of a Unitree robot dog had “crossed the red line of information and national security”. “[This] is no different from sending a Chinese Trojan horse into the daily lives of citizens in Taipei City,” Chien wrote on Facebook.
In a statement, the council’s new works division said it had bought only one robot, via a subcontractor, as a trial for maintenance inspections, and that while it was made by Unitree in China, the camera system was developed by the Taiwanese contractor Supratech. The statement said the new works division would “prioritise clearing the security concerns before any further step is taken”.
A Unitree robot mounted with Taiwan-built camera systems was displayed at a Taipei tech trade show last year.
China’s ruling Communist party claims Taiwan as Chinese territory, and is preparing to annex it, by military force if necessary. In the meantime, it barrages Taiwan with near daily grey-zone harassment, espionage and cyber-attacks. Taiwan has enacted strict laws and regulations about the importation and use of Chinese technology and equipment.
Comments under Chien’s social media post were fiercely critical of the city authorities. “I could instantly tell that the model is from Unitree. The Taipei City government has zero awareness on information security,” said one commenter. Another asked: “Are you collecting data and paving a way for the PLA to conduct urban warfare here?”.
The Taiwanese military commentator Wang Cheng-ming urged the city government to be more cautious about using Chinese technology, noting there were domestic projects in development that could be used instead. “Crucial” mapping data gathered by the robot, which could not be obtained through satellite or photographs, would be highly sought after by China’s military, he added.
Taipei’s mayor, Chiang Wan-an, asked by local media about national security concerns over the robot, said the city and central governments would be discussing the “innovative experiment”.
