The U.S. Considers Ban on Exporting Surveillance Technology To China (usnews.com) 73
The South China Morning Post reports that the U.S. may be taking a stand against China. This week the U.S. House of Representatives passed a new bill that would "tighten export controls on China-bound U.S. technology that could be used to 'suppress individual privacy, freedom of movement and other basic human rights' [and] ordering the U.S. president, within four months of the legislation's enactment, to submit to Congress a list of Chinese officials deemed responsible for, or complicit in, human rights abuses in Xinjiang...
"The UIGHUR Act also demands that, on the same day, those individuals are subject to sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Act, seizing their U.S.-based assets and barring them from entry onto U.S. soil."
Reuters notes that American government officials "have sounded the alarm on China's detention of at least a million Uighur Muslims, by U.N. estimates, in the northwestern region of Xinjiang as a grave abuse of human rights and religious freedom..." U.S. congressional sources and China experts say Beijing appears especially sensitive to provisions in the Uighur Act passed by the House of Representatives this week banning exports to China of items that can be used for surveillance of individuals, including facial and voice-recognition technology...
A U.S. congressional source also said a Washington-based figure close to the Chinese government told him recently it disliked the Uighur bill more than the Hong Kong bill for "dollars and cents reasons," because the former measure contained serious export controls on money-spinning security technology, while also threatening asset freezes and visa bans on individual officials. Victor Shih, an associate professor of China and Pacific Relations at the University of California, San Diego, said mass surveillance was big business in China and a number of tech companies there could be hurt by the law if it passes.
China spent roughly 1.24 trillion yuan ($176 billion) on domestic security in 2017 -- 6.1% of total government spending and more than was spent on the military. Budgets for internal security, of which surveillance technology is a part, have doubled in regions including Xinjiang and Beijing.
"The UIGHUR Act also demands that, on the same day, those individuals are subject to sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Act, seizing their U.S.-based assets and barring them from entry onto U.S. soil."
Reuters notes that American government officials "have sounded the alarm on China's detention of at least a million Uighur Muslims, by U.N. estimates, in the northwestern region of Xinjiang as a grave abuse of human rights and religious freedom..." U.S. congressional sources and China experts say Beijing appears especially sensitive to provisions in the Uighur Act passed by the House of Representatives this week banning exports to China of items that can be used for surveillance of individuals, including facial and voice-recognition technology...
A U.S. congressional source also said a Washington-based figure close to the Chinese government told him recently it disliked the Uighur bill more than the Hong Kong bill for "dollars and cents reasons," because the former measure contained serious export controls on money-spinning security technology, while also threatening asset freezes and visa bans on individual officials. Victor Shih, an associate professor of China and Pacific Relations at the University of California, San Diego, said mass surveillance was big business in China and a number of tech companies there could be hurt by the law if it passes.
China spent roughly 1.24 trillion yuan ($176 billion) on domestic security in 2017 -- 6.1% of total government spending and more than was spent on the military. Budgets for internal security, of which surveillance technology is a part, have doubled in regions including Xinjiang and Beijing.
Re:In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not seeing the downside.
Re: In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:2)
Re: In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:1)
Re: In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:2)
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Re: In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:1)
Nice racism. Hate to tell you this - poor people of all colors and creeds are treated like shit by cops. This is true everywhere in the world. Even in ostensibly Communist countries.
Want the police to be better behaved? You'll need widespread ownership of land and the means of production. That's the only REAL reduction of poverty and inequality. Labor unions, land reform, antitrust, corporate liability reform - that's how we get there.
Re: In other news China retaliates by ... (Score:1)
Lick those boots, AC!
Cold War with China has begun (Score:3)
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The Economist sad view of the issue:
There is little the West can do to persuade China to dismantle the camps in Xinjiang. Western governments have remonstrated, to no avail. America this month imposed sanctions on Chinese officials and businesses implicated in the mass internments, but the gesture was little more than symbolic. The Communist Party may be embarrassed, but it will not be badly hurt. The West may not be able to determine the fate of places such as Xinjiang, but it can at least help tell their stories.
https://www.economist.com/lead... [economist.com]
Re:Cold War with China has begun, (Score:4, Insightful)
It'll be interesting to see if and how long the Chinese can withstand this barrage across multiple fronts before they finally crack.
I submit that this line of reasoning is flawed. The USA would have been somewhat assured of success in the early 80s, when the USA's GDP was at least 10 times that of China.
As of now, China is a major player in world affairs to the extent that the USA cannot field any 5G manufacturing concern now! Who would have thought this is possible?
The Europeans and Russians largely scoffed at the USA's threats against Nord Stream; gas will be flowing pretty soon. Russia just began pumping gas to China [youtube.com], via the so called Power of Siberia pipeline This only confirms the fact that America is not as relevant as it used to be.
All empires eventually collapse; America's hegemony is next, sadly.
Re:Cold War with China has begun, (Score:5, Informative)
It'll be interesting to see if and how long the Chinese can withstand this barrage across multiple fronts before they finally crack.
I submit that this line of reasoning is flawed. The USA would have been somewhat assured of success in the early 80s, when the USA's GDP was at least 10 times that of China.
As of now, China is a major player in world affairs to the extent that the USA cannot field any 5G manufacturing concern now! Who would have thought this is possible?
The Europeans and Russians largely scoffed at the USA's threats against Nord Stream; gas will be flowing pretty soon. Russia just began pumping gas to China [youtube.com], via the so called Power of Siberia pipeline This only confirms the fact that America is not as relevant as it used to be.
All empires eventually collapse; America's hegemony is next, sadly.
The British empire declined and became the United Kingdom - Still a world power, but no longer the greatest western power.
The Soviet Union declined and became the Russian Federation - Still a world power, but no longer the greatest eastern power.
The United States is in decline - Still the greatest western power, but less influential than it used to be.
China has risen to become the greatest eastern power, and it's reach and influence is growing throughout the world.
The European Union, if it can survive it's growing pains, is poised to become the next great western power.
If europe continues to spend it's energy picking at the US it will miss it's chance to step up and lead... the world will be run by China.
and China is going Nazi Germany! (Score:1)
and China is going Nazi Germany!
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and China is going Nazi Germany!
Going? Nazi Germany?
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The UK isn't a world power. It likes to have delusions of grandeur and think it is, but it's not.
The UK isn't even the biggest economy in Europe. Militarily it's fallen behind France. In terms of influence it threw much of that away by voting to leave the European Union, making it far less relevant and influential.
If the UK does leave the EU then maybe British people will finally realize this as we get hammered in trade deals with much bigger, more influential countries that hold all the cards. Our desperat
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:1)
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:2)
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Hmm, I don't think 5G is the measure of super power status.
No, not directly. But America's inability to manufacture its own high-tech electronics in any meaningful quantity, (never mind its declining dominance in the development of high tech), is emblematic of its declining self-sufficiency, influence, and relevance throughout the world. Also, it's laughable to think that China cares much about "export controls on China-bound U.S. technology"; but if China turns off the taps and stops all Chinese electronics from getting into the US, America will be hit pretty hard
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:2)
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These seem like valid points, but I have questions about one of them:
We would have more expensive toys we'd have to buy through intermediaries or other countries.
If the expensive toys originate in China, then how is the Chinese economy going to be hurt? And aren't there a lot of electronics products, (such as IC's), that are being made pretty much exclusively in China? Plus, what about the States' dependence on Chinese rare-earth metals? [reuters.com]
Yes, a US trade embargo would hurt China's economy - but I think their growing interests in and trade with Africa and South America, plus trade with Russia and oth
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:2)
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:2)
Re: Cold War with China has begun, (Score:1)
Re: Way Queerer Than You (Score:2)
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It'll be interesting to see if and how long the Chinese can withstand this barrage across multiple fronts before they finally crack.
Crack... how? It's true that the US is doing a number of different things against China, but it's doing those different things for different reasons. Trump started the trade war because he thinks he's a great negotiator and claimed that he could get economic concessions from China. (Though the first tariff he applied was on solar panels, so he's probably mixing his motivations there.) If China "cracks" on that front it would be in the form of a more favorable trade agreement. If we're being generous we'll j
Re: Cold War with China has begun (Score:2)
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Re: Cold War with China has begun (Score:2)
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This is not a bad thing, these are separate issues and they need to remain separate. My fear, as I said, is that they'll be conflated togeth
Re: Cold War with China has begun (Score:2)
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waste of time (Score:4, Insightful)
nothing to ban since china makes most of it anyway.
Should that not be "ban on importing"? (Score:3)
I mean, China is obviously years ahead in that area. Since the US is trying to go the same way as China has, I would expect that this tech gets imported, not exported....
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I would expect that this tech gets imported
t.h.i.s.
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No matter... (Score:2, Informative)
Self-ban China. Stop buying into CHINA, ' made in China' and the CHINA biometric invasion.
CHINA's Uighur encampment, organ harvest and murder are high crimes beyond moral turpitude. Unconscionable, unacceptable and inhumane.
Vote with your greenback. Stop participating in China.
Big Brother is not going to protect you, unless you like faceID coming to the U.S. of A.
A good first step (Score:2)
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Re: A good first step (Score:1)
Absolutely. If we want once again to be a free country, we must forthwith stop the design, manufacture, and sale of instruments of totalitarian oppression. In a free country there is _no legitimate use_ for many of these tools.
Now of course many people prefer safety over liberty. For them, there is no problem living in a totalitarian police state, so long as it doesn't touch them personally. I guess if you're from a bourgeois family and have both a small heart and a small mind, that's a tenable position. Bu
Re: Retaliate the retaliations (Score:2)
Barn Door / Horse Analogy (Score:2)
This is like closing the barn door after the horse has escaped, lived a long, full life, and become the ancestor of a species of superintelligent carnivorous terror-horses that threaten to become the planet's dominant species.
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We should halt all trade with China (Score:2)
Re: We should halt all trade with China (Score:1)
But if we cut off relations with China, who will give our politicians their suitcases full of cash in dark parking lots? We don't actually expect our government leaders to live in their so-low-it-guarantees-corruption salaries, do we?
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Why not just ban surveillance tech outright? (Score:2)
It has only ever been used for evil.
Really? (Score:2)
I thought they already had plenty to do with regulating Chinese toilets, so that you have to flush only once.
Another dead bill (Score:1)
To what effect (Score:2)