I bought DJI’s banned camera — it was cheap and easy

As a kid, I ever imagined the “black market” would beryllium for illustration the movies: Shady vendors hawking illicit equipment on dusty streets. But if you want a banned DJI Osmo Pocket 4 aliases Pocket 4 Pro camera successful the US, you tin conscionable scope for your phone.

They’re connected Temu, AliExpress, eBay, Mercari — moreover Amazon and Newegg — pinch fast, free shipping and nary consequence of tariffs aliases seizures. That’s because these cameras are already wrong the United States, contempt rules that prohibition them from entering the country.

This past month, I ordered a DJI Osmo Pocket 4 Pro from Temu. It arrived conscionable 4 days later, shipped straight from a fulfillment halfway successful Oregon, wherever a cross-border logistics institution called Blue Ocean stuffed it into a FedEx baggie for me.

After each the Temu discounts, I spent only $659.28 for the Pocket 4P Vlog Combo pinch the Mic Mini 2 and FrameTap distant power that my workfellow Dom Preston tested for us. That’s less than I paid for the Osmo Pocket 3 combo backmost successful 2023.

These cameras are banned from import into the United States, The Verge tin confirm. While nationalist records show that some DJI cameras did clear the FCC successful beforehand of the December 2025 early overseas drone ban, some were certified wrong 30 days of that prohibition — which fto the FCC usage a little-known powerfulness successful December to easy return those certifications away.

The FCC many times refused to supply an on-the-record connection astir really it utilized that rule, 47 CFR 2.962(f), to get free of the certification.

But erstwhile we asked DJI astir it, the institution confirmed to The Verge that its caller cameras are banned.

Without FCC certification, nary instrumentality pinch a power tin beryllium imported, marketed, aliases sold successful the United States. The FCC’s prohibition doesn’t return distant your existing drones aliases cameras, but it’s expected to artifact caller ones from coming successful — but once again, it appears the FCC doesn’t person the manpower aliases attraction to really crushed them.

DJI claims it’s not progressive successful the US income we’re seeing. A institution spokesperson, responding anonymously from DJI’s property email reside and who did not supply a sanction erstwhile we asked, shared this institution statement:

After inspecting my ain DJI Pocket 4 Pro from Temu, I deliberation it’s astatine slightest plausible that third-party sellers are acting connected their own. The camera starts up pinch Chinese menus, for example, and neither the camera’s regulatory surface nor the container show an FCC ID, truthful DJI astir apt didn’t conscionable opportunity “screw it, vessel the US type anyhow”:

But there’s been a shape of funny behaviour pinch DJI, whose exertion has regularly been popping up successful gadgets repackaged by companies for illustration Xtra, which ships near-identical cameras successful the US. While neither DJI nor Xtra person confirmed aliases denied a narration to The Verge, Xtra is now facing a US ban, too.

If you’re wondering why cameras are getting caught up successful a drone ban, you’re not alone. I find it difficult to judge that an almost-entirely-offline camera poses a nationalist information threat to the United States for illustration the Trump management claims. But we do cognize how they’re getting caught successful the ban. When the US authorities banned early overseas drones past December, it besides announced it was incorporating a prohibition connected “communications aliases video surveillance equipment” from DJI and Autel Robotics.

The crippled of whack-a-drone continues elsewhere. This week, HoverAir, aka Zero Zero Robotics, announced that it had secured FCC certification for its caller Versa drone, which transforms from a DJI Pocket-like camera into a flying camera by adding a brace of propeller wings. Public records show it did truthful by claiming its camera isn’t connected the Covered List, which is existent — only DJI, Autel, Huawei, ZTE, Hytera, Hikvision, and Dahua are portion of the camera ban.

But each caller overseas drones are automatically connected the Covered List unless they get a waiver. Does giving a camera wings really dodge the drone ban? You tin publication my return connected that here.