China has a culture of ripping off, and thats the problem.. they rip off so much that they try to keep them selves from getting re-ripped off by obfuscating and hiding things and purposefully sabotaging things.. government offers no protection for copyright infringement.. hikvisions region locking is a symptom.. all these security issues are a symptom because they cant trust anyone enough to collaborate.
one of our members here I found one of his videos on aliexpress, and it had been watermarked by the seller so other people would not steal it from him..
The quality of software that comes out of China is abysmal as a result, its a bunch of plagiarized code they suck up from anywhere they can find it without ever bothering to understand how the code works.. no effort is put into security other than what seems to be required and the'll gladly trash 100 emails a day from security researchers finding problems.
Its the price for cheap cameras.. to hire talented western developers performing rigorous security testing all along the way would not get you an IPCamera for under a grand, let alone under $100.. Those of us with that ability are getting paid very well now days, and few of us work on anything consumers directly own.. because well consumers dont get any real security, ever.. your door locks are pathetic, your personal information is hardly safe, your passwords suck, your gun safe I can hit with a hammer hard enough to open.. its just feel good stuff for the masses, aka security theatre.