China Signals Broad Clampdown on Company Data, Offshore Listings

China issued a sweeping warning to its biggest companies, vowing to tighten oversight of data security and overseas listings just days after Didi's contentious decision to go public in the U.S. From a report: While the statement from China's State Council on Tuesday was thin on details, it suggests Beijing is preparing to intensify a crackdown on its corporate sector that has spanned everything from property debt and fintech to antitrust issues and now cybersecurity. Rules for overseas listings will be revised, the State Council said, while publicly-traded firms will be held accountable for keeping their data secure. China also said it will step up its regulatory oversight of companies trading in offshore markets. The move comes after the cyberspace regulator announced a probe into Didi, which controls almost the entire ride-hailing market in China, and pulled the company's app from stores.

China cracks down on China

[samwichse]

Seems to me China is cracking down on their own economy. They've made themselves almost indispensable over the last 30 years. Almost. They have a strong network effect, yes. You can get everything you need to build your product in China, soup-to-nuts. But their foreign manufacturing can still begin to flee if they make it painful enough to do business there.

Re:

[chadenright]

If foreign manufacture hasn't already fled from the egregious human rights violations or issues due to being unable to ship physical products during covid, it's either decided to throw in with china until the Party throws the owners in a re-education camp or else is still ramping up its manufacture elsewhere.

Re:

[Ostracus]

They're seen what data leaks do to a country.

Re:

[infolation]

Is it too cynical to think that having siphoned IP from American Corporate and Military to quickly level up in many industries/sectors, China is aware of the outcome of a similar western grab once it starts to technologically surpass the west and is therefore shoring up its defences ASAP before holes become unpluggable?

Re:

[rtb61]

With the right data to mine, you can track every single spy on the planet by back tracing everyone to their earlier data. You could tell when they went to get their training and when they completed it and where they are now and where they have been and where they are going, so you can find out what they are doing.

With enough data disappearing and appearing spy vs spy types can be tracked back to the original data, compared to their new data and whoop, whoop, whoop, we have a spy (only spies will have the c

Re:China cracks down on China

[Gravis Zero]

But their foreign manufacturing can still begin to flee if they make it painful enough to do business there.

This is precisely what they are working to stop. They want to ensure your data is in China and only in China. They want to be able to access the data or have the authority to destroy it if they so choose. This is all about maintaining control.

Re:

[AmiMoJo]

Maybe they saw what the EU did with GDPR, saw how things are in the US where there is almost no data protection, and picked the former.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

I'm starting to wonder if the inevitable revolt against the Chinese (excuse for a) government is going to come from all the big privately-owned Chinese companies.

raise

[fulldecent]

At first, you might think this was a bait and switch // Didi took in ~USD 4B (of mostly foreign money?) in an IPO last week // then China greatly reduced the value of that company. So basically they shafted foreign investors.

^^ That's one narrative and I would have liked to see reporters be critical of China CCP for effectively taking foreign money on a fraudulent basis.

BUT

Since China CCP is really axing its own private sector, they clearly have skin in the game here and so it offsets the above. And this ax

Re:

[CaffeinatedBacon]

It's really just the company that suckered in all that extra cash.
They knew they were under investigation. And they were warned to delay their IPO. [bloomberg.com]

Chinese regulators asked Didi as early as three months ago to delay the listing because of national security concerns involving its huge trove of data, Bloomberg News reported.

But knowing they would list for less if they waited, they rushed it through as fast as they could [todayuknews.com], to get as much money as they could. Knowing full well the stock would be worth less late

Joined-up government

[VeryFluffyBunny]

This is what joined-up government looks like. They evaluate the risks of poor IT security & dodgy financing to the Chinese economy & legislate accordingly -- They protect domestic markets, create opportunities, mitigate threats, & aren't afraid to make big changes & investments. That's what joined-up govt. does.

Re:Joined-up government

[chadenright]

By "joined-up" you mean, "scared dictatorship", right?

"Protect domestic markets" means "Send dissenters off for organ harvesting;"

"Create opportunities" means "Imprison any businessmen who become wealthy enough to threaten the dictator's power,"

"Mitigate threats" means, "Pretend the pandemic wasn't squarely their fault and that they weren't welding sick people into their homes to die,"

"Aren't afraid to make big changes and investments" means, "Commits genocide and enslaves an entire people for the crime of being Muslim"

That's what a scared dictatorship government looks like when it's so terrified of its own people that everyone is an enemy.

Re:

[VeryFluffyBunny]

Adversarial governments & organised crime syndicates don't care what your political views are. They'll pwn your machines & do whatever they want with them & your data anyway.

Re:

[Panjm]

Stop baseless false accusation you biased ignorant idiot. Muslim population in China grows from 20 million 10 years ago to more than 30 million today (*). What kind of genocide this is? Native Americans dropped from 2.1~18 million to 250 thousand (**), that was genocide! Please save your time and blame your media for feeding you fake information and lies and your government for failure to deal with the covid-19 pandemic. (*) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] (**) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]