Whenever I see threads and comments about privacy-related or sensitive topics, I often see concerns about China in particular stealing all that data.
Why is China, a country across a vast ocean, is seen as a bigger threat in that regard than US itself? Unlike Chinese, the local government does have power over its residents and can actually use this information against you (and it does have a record for doing exactly that). The only places where Chinese espionage would be a concern (military, high-tech industry) lay way beyond what an everyday American faces regularly.
So, is it a new red scare, or is there a substance behind it that I fail to see?
Not a US citizen, but i guess no one like their data get send to foreign country, especially the authoritarian one, just like China doesn’t want their citizens data get send to US. It’s really just both side very aware of what the other can do and will do, especially after seeing what russian can do in 2016 US election.
Because the CCP is run by a powerful sociopaths famous for stealing information and abusing human rights.
We’ve had our spray nozzle copied by the Chinese. Industrial espionage is not just high tech.
Chinese espionage does not benefit you in any way. The preferred amount for citizens and governments would be zero.
Domestic
spyingsurveillance (can be argued) prevent/catch crimes. So some level of surveillance the benefit of less crime is worth the intrusion to the average citizen.For citizens, there are other factors at play. For example, Chinese companies stealing American technologies could lead to the former being able to produce something for cheap, which, if tariffs wouldn’t get involved, will allow an everyday person to have a better bargain.
Chinese companies stealing American technologies could lead to the former being able to produce something for cheap, which, … will allow an everyday person to have a better bargain.
While the company that originally created the product will collapse, putting people out of work and weakening the American economy.
That’s basically what the globalization movement from the 1980s and 90s was. Jobs may move overseas, but think of the cheap shit you can buy!The hollowing out of Western economies has led to the political moment we’re in now.
This is a shit take from someone (you) who seems to have zero understanding of economics.
Do I?
Of course I am aware that moving industry abroad has the potential to reduce the amount of local jobs and taxes, while also shifting the trade balance between the countries.
But, as things stand, the only thing keeping many American industries afloat is protectionist policies, which gradually degrade industry’s ability to be price-competitive even further. This is not sustainable, and there should be other approaches - otherwise, the American economy is a slow bomb.
And for all that circus, a regular American has to pay. A lot. In some industries, this literally leads to goods being sold for twice or more of their actual worth.
I mean, the subject of “Chinese Espionage in the United States” has a fairly lengthy page all of its own on Wikipedia with examples and concerns. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_espionage_in_the_United_States
Probably one of the most notable examples:
Between 2010 and 2012, intelligence breaches led to Chinese authorities dismantling CIA intelligence networks in the country, killing and arresting a large number of CIA assets within China.[43] A joint CIA/FBI counterintelligence operation, codenamed “Honey Bear”, was unable to definitively determine the source of the compromises, though theories include the existence of a mole, cyber-espionage, compromise of Hillary Clinton’s illicit classified email server as noted by the intelligence community inspector general,[44] or poor tradecraft.[43]Mark Kelton, then the deputy director of the National Clandestine Service for Counterintelligence, was initially skeptical that a mole was to blame.[43]
In January 2018, a former CIA officer named Jerry Chun Shing Lee[note 1] was arrested at John F. Kennedy International Airport, on suspicion of helping dismantle the CIA’s network of informants in China.[47][48]
And that’s just one we all know about. Not to mention a rich history of Chinese state-sponsored corporate espionage and a history of let’s say playing fast and loose with international norms, human rights, etc.
I can’t speak for other Americans (USA, in particular, which is who I assume you meant), but for me it’s the nature of the oligarchical regime and their views on individualism. I’ve read the Chinese CSL, and spent a couple of days in a session presented by international lawyers and security professionals explaining what it meant for our business, how we needed to navigate it, and how it was being implemented. It’s scary.
Information is power; specific information about you is power over you. It’s control.
As for the government, I think it’s more a matter of the fact that China is far more well positioned and equipped to surveil US assets. Russia is bumbling, pre-occupied, and doesn’t make any computer components we use. Chinese chips, on the other hand, are in everything. The US is worried that, in a conflict, we could discover that China is able to simply… turn off all of the F35s. Or shut down or coopt firing systems on our war ships. Or disable coms or NV gear of ground troops. All of our modern equipment is computerized to more or lesser degree, and the failure of even seemingly simple resisters, sourced from China, could result in misoperation of gear, at best. If the espionage is more sophisticated, with more important components, it’s conceivable China could locate and monitor assets; missiles which ignore counter measures and always hit because the target is broadcasting a homing signal.
Most off these hypotheticals are probably not within the realm of current technology, and that what access China is able to embed in computer components is far more limited. But we don’t really know, and it’s far more dangerous to underestimate than to overestimate capabilities.
While a certain extent of it is just paranoia, there’s also the fact that China as a nation has a long standing arrogance about how it views others that the Xi regime seems a little too eager to return to.
A rather infamous incident involving the guy who basically is China’s founding father and great liberator revolved around him being kidnapped by Qing agents in London, because the imperial throne had long presumed that their authority was absolute everywhere, and saw zero reason why they should consider not arresting someone on another country’s soil.
I bring this incident up because it’s what the legitimate security concern actually revolves around, China has begun dispatching “police agents” to their embassies who are basically there to kidnap and intimidate chinese nationals who aren’t acting “chinese enough”, and in extreme cases drag them back to beijing by their hair.
This obviously extends to dissidents who foolishly presumed they could escape Beijing’s wrath by not living in China, and to anyone seen as aiding and abetting them who aren’t high profile enough to draw attention if they get roughed up or even kidnapped themselves.
American privacy invaders are looking at you, chinese privacy invaders are parasitically attaching themselves into your eye sockets so they can look at everyone you’re looking at, and use you as an unwitting informant on anyone they’re tracking.
It’s like that bug that eats and then replaces fishes’ tongues, only if the bug was big brother and you were hyptnotized into staring at some shitty minecraft parkour while it eats your eyeball out and plugs itself into your optic nerve.
TikTok of course advertises this as a fun feature that encourages group viewing by presenting content based on your interests and also the interests of those around you “as a conversation starter.”
Suppose you were Superman and China was Lex Luthor. Would you feel comfortable with China knowing you were weak to kryptonite?
We (the US) off-shored our manufacturing labor to China because of cheap labor. We were able to continue to reap much of the benefits of this production with our intellectual property (trade secrets, patents, etc).
China will inevitably catch up in the IP game and have been quickly doing so, often through corporate espionage, sending students to study in Western schools, and just from experience building most of these physical goods.
It’s IP theft and seen as cheating. And will erode the US IP dominance faster than we’d like.
I’m pretty on the fence over it as an American personally. IP laws in general are kind of bullshit but also, we’re on our back foot economically because we have no infrastructure to build anymore. And if we no longer have the IP dominance, we have zero economic leverage.
And all that’s ignoring all the governmental and civic espionage that has other uncomfortable implications.
There are two considerations.
For the American government and corporations, Chinese espionage is an obvious and real threat. NVidia doesn’t want China to steal their chip designs and the Pentagon doesn’t want China to steal military info.
For American private citizens, it isn’t really a threat. It’s actually preferable in a way, because you know they won’t disclose whatever they learn to the American government. You might even consider buying a fully “designed and made in China” device, which the NSA might not have a backdoor to.
This only makes it more concerning to the American government, because they lose control over their citizens.
Don’t worry, fellow Americans! A hostile foreign country manipulating your government does not concern you.
The threat to American citizens is that they are steered away from their own interests and the interest of furthering democracy throughout the world because they see a curated feed that excludes information critical of China and amplifies information that promotes China as a country of harmony, peace, and prosperity.
And in some cases, the trends amplified on Chinese social media apps directly fuel American political division.
Their media is filled will propaganda, plus so little thought they can’t realise it’s easier for the US to attack you in the US than China to attack you in the US.
