Where Are The TechnoDemocracies?
The Chinese government's ambition to use technology for social control and governance is becoming increasingly clear. As this technology matures and abuses by the Chinese government increase under President Xi Jinping, the United States has vowed to fight the rise of "techno-authoritarianism." The US presents its technology and its allies as a democratic alternative. But is it true?
Popular Online is the Chinese government's Great Firewall, which prevents people in the country from accessing hundreds of thousands of websites outside of China. Using a mix of coercion and inducement, authorities are forcing major Chinese internet companies to more effectively censor online speech using a mix of human and artificial intelligence. Attempts to "scale" firewalls or expose sensitive data, such as using aliases or graphics, do not fit into this unequal arms race.
In the offline and physical space, China's Ministry of Public Security (MPS) has developed a multi-layered national mass surveillance architecture over the past two decades, connecting ever-expanding networks around people. The government issues a national identity card to every citizen and people need to use that number to access many public and private services. This "real name registration" requirement allows police to collect and compile a database of personal profiles associated with a person's ID. Meanwhile, the government is covering the country with closed circuit surveillance cameras (CCTV). Authorities have bought artificial intelligence technology from some private companies with ties to the government and the military to help them automatically analyze the information they need from streams of public surveillance footage.
The Chinese government's mass surveillance system doesn't just seek to identify specific individuals from the crowd. Their goal is to turn "unstructured data" into "structured data," turning a cluttered display space into something like a text file that can be easily parsed and searched automatically. In vision, AI gathers information from live or archived footage such as the size and direction of crowds, the color and type of objects present, even if a person has acne or droopy eyebrows. As a result, searches based on this feature ("Where is the red umbrella") can easily be performed in real time as well.
While Chinese police certainly rely heavily on visual surveillance in the form of CCTV networks, their surveillance systems also include other technologies. It includes an IMSI catcher, which finds and tracks all connected and networked phones in a given area, thereby automatically identifying unique identifiers of people's phones and other connected devices, such as IMEI numbers and MAC addresses. Surveillance includes a large collection of samples of people's speech, DNA, iris scans and even their movements to create multimodal portraits.
For example, 3D printed masks can be avoided to prevent facial recognition, but the goal of multimodal mass surveillance is broad, pervasive, pervasive and almost inevitable. Police use analytical systems to identify relationships and identify violations. In Xinjiang, where the government has cracked down on Uyghurs, for example, a big data system known as the Unified Joint Operations Platform detects behavior that authorities find suspicious, such as a phone suddenly turning off, and identifies those individuals as agents. : Interrogation, Arbitrary Arrest and Trial.
Many of these surveillance technologies are not unique to China. Yet the depth, breadth, and penetration of the Chinese government's mass surveillance of its citizens is perhaps unprecedented in modern history. This massive control is uncontroversial in China, as there is little significant oversight of government power and the MPS is largely unaccountable.
Other state tools, such as central bank digital currencies, which allow authorities to track and monitor public financial transactions, among other things, are not part of the MPS police architecture. But they bear the stamp of the Chinese government's technocratic authoritarianism. A form of top-down management that controls people and greatly influences their behavior by setting limits on what is acceptable and what is not.
The emerging and developing Chinese "technosphere" also contains other technologies that are both functional and profitable. Dozens of countries have reportedly adopted Huawei's 5G equipment. Beijing's Beido navigation system now dominates the US version of GPS in more than 160 countries. TikTok, owned by China's ByteDance, has gone global. Alibaba is expanding into Southeast Asia and Tencent's WeChat is sustaining the lives of the Chinese diaspora.
Although most of these are private companies based in China, they are all subject to varying degrees of pressure, censorship and regulation from the Chinese government. Studying technological systems and their impact on society at large is very difficult because many of these systems are black boxes whose trade secrets are closely guarded by companies. But because of China's lack of rule of law and press freedom, it is very difficult to get information from these companies or hold them accountable for abuses.
The Chinese technosphere is based on a highly innovative management model. A technocratic state ruled by strongmen who effectively presented the illusion of modernity and progress to the masses. On the other hand, democracies with competitive elections, free media and independent judiciaries seem sluggish, disorganized, prey to special interests and incapable of meeting the challenges of our time. The bells and whistles of these government-style technologies add to the overall Chinese Communist Party effort to make democracy look obsolete.
However, it is important not to overestimate the prowess of China's technosphere. China's police mass surveillance ambitions often face challenges, such as integrating data across data silos. But if the overall picture of China's techno-authoritarianism becomes increasingly clear, how will democracies, particularly the United States, respond?
The US government sees the Chinese government as its main rival and makes competition, including technology, a matter of value. For example, former President Donald Trump's net network effort seeks to encourage other governments and network operators to work with companies that meet certain standards; Transparent ownership structure excluding Chinese companies from US telecommunications networks. It has also restricted Chinese tech companies' access to US technology, finance and markets, citing human rights concerns. Instead, the Biden administration created the US-EU Council on Commerce and Technology, "new technologies based on shared democratic values, including respect for human rights."
Although these initiatives come from different sides of the political divide, they emphasize the values associated with the words "democracy" and "human rights" in this policy document.
However, there are at least three flaws in this US government story. First, the stated motivation to promote certain values masks the real politics and protectionism behind at least some of China's technology-related actions. While it's true that TikTok poses privacy risks, sensitive information from almost anyone in the U.S., for example, is also available on data brokerage marketplaces. That's because Congress has never created a common national standard that would significantly limit the way most businesses collect, use, buy, and sell personal information. If the Trump administration really cares about privacy, it will prioritize federal privacy rules in 2019 that appear to have bipartisan support.
Second, history assumes that technology built and designed in the United States or other democracies naturally and automatically respects rights. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Democracy-oriented initiatives have been closely linked to the establishment of China's government-controlled state from the beginning. North American companies are said to have helped build Beijing's surveillance architecture, including the Great Firewall. American companies continue to provide "materials, funding and know-how" to bolster China's surveillance infrastructure. Some of the same companies are listed as "clean" in Trump's Clean Clean Plan because they "refuse to do business with the CCP state surveillance apparatus."
Meanwhile, US mass surveillance, the scope and intrusion of which was exposed by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, has strengthened partners in China's military-police surveillance complex. American scrutiny of allies and partners, such as calls from the European Commission or former German Chancellor Angela Merkel, has left a lasting transatlantic trail. The idea that technology developed or produced by democracies (or even close allies) is inevitable or inherently safe, or that technology respects rights, has not always resonated in Europe.
Across the country, US mass surveillance and data collection have undermined press freedom, the public's right to know, the right to counsel, and the ability of Americans to hold government accountable, as Human has documented. Observe the right. Even in cities across the United States, and especially in overprotected communities of color, the advent of facial recognition has put people at risk of walking freely on the streets without government oversight.
In addition, the business models that some influential US technology companies rely on are fundamentally incompatible with human rights. This model relies on an online advertising ecosystem that captures and profiles what people say or do online and publishes that data to drive attention and engagement across platforms by selling targeted advertising. The platform's economics are based on massive tracking and profiling of users that invade people's privacy, and a feed algorithm that promotes and amplifies divisive and sensational content.
Finally, the idea that the application of "democratic values with respect for human rights" can replace the safeguards and controls necessary for a functioning democracy to create the disclosure of technological solutions and facilitate the functioning of technological systems.
Good narrative vs. The evil use of the US government obscures its role and the role of Western corporations in undermining human rights and democracy, along with their global influence. In other countries, the privacy of individuals and civil society organizations is threatened not only by mass surveillance systems sold by Chinese companies, but also by technology companies, many of which were founded in democracies, as well as by rigid business models. And the experience they export.
If the United States is willing to redefine and prioritize rights at home and abroad, China may offer a viable alternative to digital authoritarianism.
First, Congress is expected to pass strong federal data protection legislation that would regulate the collection, analysis and sharing of personal data by companies, including security and intelligence agencies. It will further protect sensitive personal data, including biometric data, and consider banning facial recognition by law enforcement agencies. It should regulate the use of data by advertisers and data brokers. In addition, the law requires human rights impact assessments for US technology companies' global operations. Congress should also reform national security surveillance laws, such as repealing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to stop mass data collection.
মার্কিন যুক্তরাষ্ট্রের উচিত সমমনা সরকারগুলির সাথে কাজ করা উচিত যাতে তারা আন্তঃসীমান্ত চাপকে সহজতর না করে তা নিশ্চিত করার জন্য দেশে এবং সারা বিশ্বে রপ্তানি নিয়ন্ত্রণ ব্যবস্থা জোরদার করতে পারে৷ এই কাজটি অপমানজনক সিস্টেমের বিকাশ এবং সমর্থনের সাথে জড়িত চীনা কোম্পানিগুলির উপর গবেষণায় বিশেষ মনোযোগ দেওয়া উচিত। চীনের নজরদারি প্রযুক্তি বড় ব্যবসা, এবং সেখানে কতজন অভিনেতা রয়েছে, তারা কীভাবে একে অপরের সাথে সম্পর্কযুক্ত এবং সবচেয়ে গুরুত্বপূর্ণভাবে, চীনের বাইরের কোম্পানিগুলি এই কঠোর ব্যবস্থায় কতটা জড়িত, বিশেষ করে দ্বিপাক্ষিক পদ্ধতি. . .technology এবং সেগুলি শেয়ার করুন।
চীনা প্রযুক্তি সংস্থাগুলির উপর মার্কিন নিষেধাজ্ঞাগুলি কাঙ্ক্ষিত প্রভাব ফেলছে কিনা বা সংস্থাগুলি তাদের এড়াতে পারে কিনা তা নির্ধারণের জন্য আরও গবেষণা প্রয়োজন। মার্কিন যুক্তরাষ্ট্রের উচিত প্রযুক্তিগত মান-সেটিং সংস্থাগুলিতে সমমনা সরকারগুলির সাথে তার কাজকে অগ্রাধিকার দেওয়া এবং প্রসারিত করা উচিত, যেমন আন্তর্জাতিক টেলিকমিউনিকেশন ইউনিয়ন, প্রযুক্তিগত মান, বিশেষ করে ইন্টারনেট গভর্নেন্স মানগুলিতে মানবাধিকার কাঠামোকে অন্তর্ভুক্ত করতে।
কিন্তু শুধুমাত্র প্রবিধান দিয়ে খারাপ প্রবণতা সীমিত করা যথেষ্ট নয়। মার্কিন সরকারের উচিত প্রযুক্তিগত ব্যবস্থার মতো সাহসী প্রস্তাব নিয়ে পরীক্ষা করার জন্য তার সম্পদ বিনিয়োগ করা যা গণতন্ত্রের উপর ইতিবাচক প্রভাব ফেলতে পারে। মার্কিন অলাভজনক সংস্থা নিউ পাবলিক সরকারকে "ডিজিটাল পাবলিক স্পেস", পাবলিক অনলাইন স্পেসগুলিকে সর্বজনীন পণ্যগুলিকে সর্বাধিক করার জন্য ডিজাইন করা হয়েছে যাতে লোকেরা "উদ্দীপনার সাথে কথা বলতে, শেয়ার করতে এবং ইন্টারঅ্যাক্ট করতে" বলেছে। কাঠামোর উপর ভিত্তি করে। »তাইওয়ানের সরকার একটি নাগরিক হ্যাকার সমষ্টির সাথে অংশীদারিত্ব করেছে যা g0v নামে পরিচিত, সমষ্টিগত অড্রে ট্যাং-এর একজন সদস্য, যিনি পরে দেশের ডিজিটাল মন্ত্রী হয়েছিলেন, তার শাসনে সহযোগিতামূলক সিদ্ধান্ত গ্রহণকে অন্তর্ভুক্ত করতে। বার্সেলোনা ডিসিডিম আরেকটি পরীক্ষা যা অংশগ্রহণমূলক গণতন্ত্রের জন্য একটি প্ল্যাটফর্ম অন্তর্ভুক্ত করে।
মার্কিন যুক্তরাষ্ট্র তার সবচেয়ে খারাপ প্রযুক্তিগত প্রবণতাকে নিয়ন্ত্রণ করে, তার প্রযুক্তিকে ভুল হাতে পড়া থেকে রোধ করে এবং গণতান্ত্রিক অংশগ্রহণকে উৎসাহিত করে এমন প্রযুক্তির বিকাশকে সমর্থন করে ঘরে বসেই প্রকৃত নেতা হতে পারে। এটি চীন সরকারের ডিজিটাল কর্তৃত্ববাদের একটি বাস্তব বিকল্প প্রদান করবে।
