Privacy
Personal data is collected every second, with every click, every move, and each decision you make. In this regard, the Chinese Communist Party ‘CCP’ insists on obtaining control of all data that a business or any organization generates. This line of thought follows the belief that with data, the government can build a more productive economy and make efficient and constructive decisions, based on ‘hard science rather than intuition’ (Kynge, 2021).
Prior to this, individuals believed that they are in control of the data they share and generate, however, the nation is now advancing to a data-driven empire; and the more information it has, the more powerful it becomes. In China, Kynge (2021) reports that personal data is a mixture of online interactions, shopping behavior, types of transactions, habits and routines, usage and intensity, and the most frequent interactions. This digital profile is developing through the legal regulations of providing data to the government, surveillance cameras, smart cities, digital money and modernized and technologically developed systems all over the country (Ma, 2018).
Change of System
Interestingly, China enforced a regulation that all information created in the country remains there. This results with multinationals establishing data centers to keep the Chinese customer’s data, which in turn, the government can access at any period they want. Tesla and Apple already issued a center for the products sold in China and is cooperating with this new law, in order to maintain the revenue stream and access a larger market.
However …
Will data prove to be a weapon or a shelter to authoritarian governance? How will digital sovereignty evolve over time? Will other countries follow the digital social card system to diminish tech giants’ power and gain more control?
After all, the danger of artificial intelligence and data collection is the asymmetric information the owner acquires.
References
Kynge, J., 2021. China and Big Tech: Xi’s blueprint for a digital dictatorship. Financial Times.
Ma, A., 2018. China is building a Vast civilian surveillance network – here are 10 ways it could be feeding its CREEPY ‘social credit system’. China is building a vast civilian surveillance network. Available at: https://www.businessinsider.nl/how-china-is-watching-its-citizens-in-a-modern-surveillance-state-2018-4?international=true&r=US [Accessed September 25, 2021].
Very interesting post, thank you for sharing it! The data localization law China has in place is indeed very interesting, especially in combination with China’s Great firewall. While from a Data Privacy perspective it might be desirable to have the personal data of Chinese citizens that is processed by foreign companies being stored locally, it puts a financial and organisational burden on those companies. Multinational companies often times use IT systems and servers across borders due to their company structures. Having a law in place to store data locally, requires often times a change in the IT infrastructure and an acquisition of a local server that does not duplicate into other servers. Consequentially, these parts of the companies often times operate more separately from other markets within a Company group for example. Interestingly, multinational companies face a similar issue in Russia, where in 2015 a personal data law was issued that made it legally obligatory for data controllers to store data collected from Russian citizens locally in databases in Russia.
Very interesting post, thank you for sharing it! The data localization law China has in place is indeed very interesting, especially in combination with China’s Great firewall. While from a Data Privacy perspective it might be desirable to have the personal data of Chinese citizens that is processed by foreign companies being stored locally, it puts a financial and organisational burden on those companies. Multinational companies often times use IT systems and servers across borders due to their company structures. Having a law in place to store data locally, requires often times a change in the IT infrastructure and an acquisition of a local server that does not duplicate into other servers. Consequentially, these parts of the companies often times operate more separately from other markets within a Company group for example. Interestingly, multinational companies face a similar issue in Russia, where in 2015 a personal data law was issued that made it legally obligatory for data controllers to store data collected from Russian citizens locally in databases in Russia.
Hey Kamilla thanks for your post, I always like being provoked into the conversation of socio-political ramifications of data collection. It reminded me a bit of a book I read this summer called the future of an illusion by Sigmund Freud. Although the book majoratively discusses the long-term consequences of society losing any form of control through religion, it touches on some interesting points about technology. The one that I find relevant and want to bring up is the point that the attempt to establish control from the top-down in a political environment has always lacked the capacity and tools to do so on a large scale. Even the USSR where the government had hired and hidden countless secret agents to monitor and civilize society could not handle the potential for uprising and keep track of enough people.
A scary and interesting implication of the politicization of data is the capacity to lose liberties of freedom that allow citizens do disrupt a society they don’t believe in as the coordinated attempt to do so can be shut down and swayed before it ever happens. I personally believe that China exemplifies a very dark turn in the capacity and freedom of a society to govern and change itself, and just found that relevant to share.
Again thank you for sharing and all the best 🙂