
China is building a digital dictatorship to exert control over its 1.4B citizens - kumarharsh
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-18/china-social-credit-a-model-citizen-in-a-digital-dictatorship/10200278
======
booleandilemma
“Buying too much alcohol might suggest dependence; she’ll lose a couple of
points.”

Credit card companies are already doing things like this.

 _What one of the executives there did, he looked at how people were using
Canadian Tire credit cards and tracking what products they actually purchased.
Then he found out that people, who for instance buy premium wild bird seed, it
turns out that they very infrequently went bad on their debts. Whereas people
who bought chrome accessories for their car, they walked away from their debts
more frequently._

[https://www.marketplace.org/2009/05/15/business/how-
credit-c...](https://www.marketplace.org/2009/05/15/business/how-credit-card-
companies-track-you)

~~~
blacksmith_tb
My cynical take would be that alcoholics (and other people whose self-
destructive habits you could mine from their purchase behavior) would be less
likely to make waves or rebel, so I'd have thought you'd lose a couple of
points for never buying any alcohol... Also odd that "buying nappies" earns
you points for being responsible, presumably the Great Database already knows
you are a parent?

------
forthwall
As much as it seems like a foreign concept, I wonder what parallels can we
derive from a state-backed social credit system to say something like our
corporate-backed financial credit scores. We see that companies from health
insurers to cell phone providers are already adopting skimming through your or
your demographic's purchase history to see if you are worthy of success or
not.

Not defending China, but boogeymen pieces like this evoke responses like this
is a truly non-western concept and not just a "hardcore" version of what we
have

------
soneil
I'm genuinely curious to see how this works out. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad
I'm not part of it - but I can't help be fascinated.

Growing up, we cared what the neighbours thought. They were our "social
score". If we skipped school, it'd be noticed. If we misbehaved, they knew it.
And little old ladies ensured bad news travelled faster that twitter.

Now life feels anonymous, and it feels like this has been lost. Anonymity,
while sometimes valuable, often leads to toxic behaviour online. A lot of
things we'd never have dreamt of doing with the 'old lady brigade' judging us.
And now the real world feels much more anonymous, and I fear the same
happening here too.

On the face of it, it seems like China have figured out how to scale the
little old ladies. This could be horribly interesting, or simply horrible. But
I think I'm glad to see someone (else) give it a shot.

~~~
erentz
I can’t understand why anybody would be glad. People in China will have their
lives ruined by this. This kind of thing has been bad when any previous
authoritarian regime did it. So tracking/controlling people doesn’t just
become okay or potentially good because you’re using computers. The Stasi etc
would’ve loved this.

~~~
echevil
As a Chinese citizen who lived in the US for a while, I'm totally in favor of
this, and especially when I go back to China. We don't value "freedom" as much
as most westerners, and the social credit system is there to make existing
laws better enforced, so bad actors can really get punished as they should.

~~~
erentz
There are hundreds of thousands currently sitting (possibly dying) in
"reeducation camps" in Xinjiang, I guess they don't value "freedom" either.
The social credit system is just a continuation of the current authoritarian
controls, and will be used to further chill any chance of dissenting opinion.
This might be fine to you individually if you find yourself on the right side
of everything, but clearly not everyone does.

~~~
Silixon
Replace "reeducation camps in Xinjiang" with "projects in Philadelphia" and
"social credit system" with "private credit ratings" and you see that we're
not as unlike as we thought. Yes, the scope and severity of the situation is
more blatant in the Chinese example, but pointing fingers overlooks that we
have similar problems brought about by similar causes in the West. Moreover,
we already have these systems in place, and we treat them like oracles. How
many poor in the West will never get a chance to be anything else because they
get stuck in a system that only sees them as an unnecessary risk? I'm not
claiming either system is good or bad. I'm saying both systems are similar and
will have similar benefits and pitfalls.

I would ask Westerners to look long and hard at our financial credit systems
and ask whether they allow dissent or whether we have simply accepted that
dissent is a largely fruitless endeavor.

~~~
yourcousinbilly
Whoa whoa whoa, just because both systems have problems and have some
similarities doesn't mean no one can complain. I'm not gonna defend the US's
problems because it doesn't matter! It's easy to see the Chinese system as
morally bad. Why? Because free speech and dissent are the mechanisms by which
we improve our ideas and systems. This social credit system backed by the
already authoritarian government will further cement the will of the party
powers over the will of the people. And everyone should care about a billion
people.

~~~
Silixon
We're agreeing. My point is that we should care about a billion people in
China and a billion people in the West and billions everywhere. You're right
that free speech and dissent are how we make change. I'm questioning the
Western perspective because it seems like free speech and dissent are reaching
limits as well. Dissent as you like, it probably won't work, and you'll
probably suffer consequences in the commercial sphere, albeit not formally in
the political or national spheres. We should keep complaining until it gets
better. I just wonder if the complaints ever get heard in good faith.

------
throwaway_trust
What was the reasoning behind social credit system? To keep track of bad
actors or create surveillance nation?

On a side note, this is what happens when "technocrats" become the ruling
class in overwhelming majority. Ability to apply technical solution to
societal problems. Most of the China's ruling class are technocrats. We need
anthropologists, social scientists, philosophers as law makers. Yes
technocrats should be there in the mix too but they alone won't fix societal
problems.

~~~
chaostheory
Probably both. It's no secret that China has long aspired to transform into
Singapore - clean and sterile. CCP leaders have been openly talking about it
for decades now. Compared to the mainland, Singapore doesn't have large issues
with stuff like crime or social order. imo Singapore has achieved it via a
technological Big Bro state.

------
woodandsteel
Defenders say this is just the latest version of traditional Chinese ways, but
that is not the case. Traditionally social trust and good behavior was
enforced by the whole network of social relations and basic values.

But in the modern era this has broken down, in part because China has gone
through 4 different basic political and economic systems in the last century,
and is now on its fifth.

So the government is now trying to enforce good behavior and social trust from
the top down. Unfortunately, unlike in Confucianism, there is no way to ensure
the people at the top are trustworthy, so the whole thing will likely become
quite dysfunctional at some point.

~~~
woodandsteel
Let me add a couple of points. Chinese defend this system in part because if
they were to criticize it they would be punished by the government. But beyond
that, in China there is no real thought about or discussion of basic political
philosophy and so people don't even know how to go about it, they can only
repeat what they have been told.

------
hzhou321
It is a system that results in rich and poor, where rich are holding stakes
and incentivized to maintain and grow their status and the poor are
insignificant to do anything. Then there is the vast middle class who don't
see the poor but only aspires for the rich. Such system exploits human nature
and has proven to be quite stable -- isn't that any society's goal after all?

It takes compassion and faith in truth, in sufficiently large doses, to
challenge such systems.

~~~
stcredzero
Where in history has there been a system that didn't either 1) Result in rich
and poor or 2) Result in oppression by force? Egalitarianism doesn't scale
past around 450 people without the introduction of some form of hierarchy.

 _It takes compassion and faith in truth, in sufficiently large doses, to
challenge such systems._

Principles can be used to challenge such systems from within. The overall
history of the United States is a good example of this. Also, the history of
the past several years is a testament to what happens when principles are
forgotten in favor of feelings.

------
just_steve_h
I sure am glad I live in a country (the U.S.) where my movements, purchases,
and public movements aren't tracked!

~~~
taobility
your purchase been tracked by some private companies, not the government

~~~
skh
Is there a meaningful difference when the latter buys it from the former? Or
when the latter can easily force it from the former?

------
07d046
According to this guy, the Western media has a habit of getting this story
very wrong:
[https://twitter.com/ChinaLawTransl8/status/10420403727660277...](https://twitter.com/ChinaLawTransl8/status/1042040372766027781)

 _There are so many things wrong with China and the world today, there is
simply no reason to make things up, and much of what is in this piece is wild
speculation or outright fabrication, belittling the real struggles of some
featured in it._

More: [https://www.chinalawtranslate.com/seeing-chinese-social-
cred...](https://www.chinalawtranslate.com/seeing-chinese-social-credit-
through-a-glass-darkly/?lang=en)

------
qkrthnu
The results will absolutely be total success. How could it result in anything
but success? Anyone who complains about any aspect of the social score system
will have their score lowered until they are effectively silenced.

Marginalizing minority views and other edge-cases is a feature of the system.

I feel very sad that there is likely to be an entire generation of Chinese
whom are crushed into the most extreme pressure to conform and obey.

#Resist #QuestionAuthority #Disobey

------
api
Can anyone Chinese or who knows more about China provide any insight into why
they're doing this? Is there some local political reality?

My reading is that they're worried about their explosive GDP growth leveling
out and the political instability a debt crisis might cause.

~~~
echevil
I'm speaking as a Chinese citizen who is totally in favor of this. Here's some
perspective I can give:

"credit system" is far less established than countries like US, and private
companies are generally much less trusted by the government and by the people
(which is the opposite to the US). Some big private companies like Alibaba has
started to create credit systems themselves, but the state owned banks and law
enforcement would only use something backed by the government.

The "social credit system" it actually not that different from other credit
systems excepted it is managed by government. It's really needed now given
that there was a rising debt default problem -> Without a credit system, many
people thought they can just delete the app where they borrowed money and get
away with it. It became a crisis when a lot of this happened at the same time.

Surveillance is a separate topic. It's one of the technology advances that
made law enforcement easier (like DNA samples are much more used nowadays in
identifying criminals). There has been reports that criminals being captured
with these new tools. It's something that western people fears a lot, so all
the western reports focuses on the negative side of it and exaggerate it many
times more.

~~~
yourcousinbilly
Aren't you worried the silencing of dissent will hide a very dysfunctional
world from you? Aren't you worried it has happened already and your opinion
has already been influenced?

~~~
echevil
I’m sure there are darker side of China that the government would love to hide
and there are many parts of the society that’s disfunctional. That’s no secret
in China, most people are aware about that. I’m sure my opinions are
influenced by all the stuff I’ve read and seen, and I try to keep an open eye
and have been traveling around the world. But no one has “god’s view”, most
western media are also writing articles that supports their existing views.
“Fake news” is no longer a new concept to the west and it indeed can distort
people’s beliefs. Even when media report the truth, selecting what to report
and choosing the tone can also influence people’s views to a great extent.
When it comes to topics about China, the western media (and Chinese media as
well, in a different way) can be quite extreme. I’m sure your opinions are
also being influenced, it’s too hard not to be

------
Leary
Maybe more western news pieces like this will cause the Chinese people to
reconsider this system.

~~~
mc32
Why would they care and why should they care what we think?

They should make their own self-assessment and figure out what works form them
by themselves.

Ther system evolved from different badic principles and that has arrived at
diffetent conclusions.

That said, things can radically change as in Japan during WWii —> Pracetime
transition, but that requires buy-in from all involved to avoid what usually
happens during radical change (Tsarist to Sowiet; Dynasty —> Republic —> PRC).

~~~
merpnderp
How are they going to figure out what works for them? Vote for the individual
who best represents their views? How exactly to individuals even get a say in
"what works for them"?

~~~
mc32
That’s a bit tangential. Even if you got them all exposed to our opinions,
what does that do in terms of actionability? They would be in the same place.
Change has to come from within.

------
z0r
I can't foresee this backfiring at all!

------
djohnston
what if it actually works out fine long term and our western sensibilities
were just wrong in the context of china

~~~
merpnderp
How could it possibly not be abused to gain power? What checks and balances
are there? Out of all the past data points we have throughout history, which
one points to governments with unchecked power not abusing it? And is there
any more powerful example of unchecked power than an unelected state single
party government who can monitor every action of every individual and
unvoice/unperson them with the click of a button?

~~~
erentz
The parent has the flaw that a lot of people do. They don’t seem to understand
that not everyone is a mostly decent person and that there exist bad actors in
any population. You can’t get away from this in any society, for example what
percentage are psychopaths? That means if you create systems (like this) that
eventually bad actors can exploit for themselves, they will, and they do. It’s
not a conspiracy. It doesn’t happen right away. But slowly it’ll happen that
the few percent can use these tools in ways to serve themselves over the
interests of the wider population. (I don’t know why this is hard to
comprehend, just look at the bad actors around you in your $dayjob.)

------
Animats
China has had a "police census" for centuries. Under communism, they had the
dang'an, a lifetime work record maintained by each citizen's work unit. But
with a more mobile population and more private employers, the paper based
dang'an system didn't scale. So, now the social credit system. It's not new,
just more automated.

------
liftbigweights
Didn't we have this exact same story yesterday? And the day before? And the
day before that?

When the EU, Australia and Canada does it, the news frames it positively as
combating "hate" speech. When china does it, it's digital dictatorship.

For an industry, especially so in australia, that loves censorship and digital
dictatorship, the media sure do love to criticize china about theirs. Maybe
it's just envy.

