
Does China’s digital police state have echoes in the West? - helenakyso
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2018/05/31/does-chinas-digital-police-state-have-echoes-in-the-west
======
K0nserv
The other article[0] linked in this one is well worth a read. I had never
heard about Uyghurs or China's treatment of them before I read the reddit
thread yesterday about phone spyware. It's pretty appalling and what more how
the western tech community idolizes China and their tech scene while looking
right past atrocities like this.

0: [https://www.economist.com/briefing/2018/05/31/china-has-
turn...](https://www.economist.com/briefing/2018/05/31/china-has-turned-
xinjiang-into-a-police-state-like-no-other)

~~~
rgrieselhuber
Also take a look at the assaults on free speech in the UK.

~~~
DanBC
Most (although not all) of the examples are bullshit that include people
making credible threats of violence.

Which particular example are you thinking of?

~~~
rgrieselhuber
Rotherham is a great example. There are many.

~~~
rgrieselhuber
Why the downvote? Not complaining but curious. This seems pretty cut and dry.

~~~
DanBC
Because there is no suppression of speech happneing about rotherham.

~~~
rgrieselhuber
That's clearly not true, unless you don't consider a cover-up and harassment
of victims and independent investigators suppression of speech.

~~~
DanBC
Hang on, are you talking about Tommy Robinson?

He interfered with an ongoing criminal trial (putting that trial at risk of
collapse) by threatening witnesses and calling the accused, before they had
been convicted "muslim paedophiles". He was filming inside the courtroom and
intimidating witnesses. He was asked to stop. He didn't stop, and he told
police he was going to go to the homes of witnesses.

He was arrested and sentenced for that contempt of court. He was given a
suspended sentence and clear instruction not to do it again.

 _He did it again_.

Notice that Yaxley-Lennon has said nothing at all about his EDL colleague who
was convicted of sexual offences against children.
[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/edl-english-
defe...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/edl-english-defence-
league-leigh-mcmillan-jailed-paedophile-old-bailey-a8231231.html)

You seem to think that Yaxley-Lennon would be free to speak in the US, but
he's been forbidden to travel to the US by the US -- that's why in 2013 he
tried to used a false passport to travel. [https://news.sky.com/story/edl-
leader-lennon-jailed-for-pass...](https://news.sky.com/story/edl-leader-
lennon-jailed-for-passport-offence-10458706)

Here's a barrister's views: [https://thesecretbarrister.com/2018/05/25/what-
has-happened-...](https://thesecretbarrister.com/2018/05/25/what-has-happened-
to-poor-tommy-robinson/)

Here's the sentencing remarks for the first convction (please read all of it.
It's short and clear):

[https://www.judiciary.uk/publications/committal-for-
contempt...](https://www.judiciary.uk/publications/committal-for-contempt-of-
court-in-open-court-at-the-crown-court-at-canterbury-yaxley-lennon/)

Here's the warning the judge gave to him:

\---begin

Would you stand up, please. I take, as I hope has been made very clear by the
comments that I have made, a very dim view indeed of your conduct which was in
the face of repeated warnings that you should not do that which you did do. I
accept what Mr. Kovalevsky tells me about the dangers that you might face were
you to be sent into immediate custody. I have to say it is on a knife edge so
far as I am concerned because a very large part of me thinks so what? you
could be put into protective custody. But, my concern is to make sure that
this trial keeps on track, and my concern is also to make sure that other
courts with other trials in similar situations are kept on track without any
danger of repetition of the kind of conduct that we have had visited upon us
here. The sentence, therefore, that I pass upon you, taking into account all
of those matters that have been placed before me and your admissions entered
via Mr. Kovalevsky, is one of three months' imprisonment which will be
suspended for a period of 18 months. That will be suspended. There will be no
conditions that need to be attached to that suspended sentence, but you should
be under no illusions that if you commit any further offence of any kind, and
that would include, I would have thought a further contempt of court by
similar actions, then that sentence of three months would be activated, and
that would be on top of anything else that you were given by any other court.
In short, Mr. Yaxley-Lennon, turn up at another court, refer to people as
"Muslim paedophiles, Muslim rapists" and so on and so forth while trials are
ongoing and before there has been a finding by a jury that that is what they
are, and you will find yourself inside. Do you understand? Thank you very
much.

~~~
rgrieselhuber
No I’m not talking about Tommy Robinson.

~~~
DanBC
So who are you talking about?

------
maxxxxx
They all learn from each other. In addition we have companies that are
building the necessary infrastructure which then probably can be used by a
surveillance state. Unless surveillance gets checked by law it will soon be
world wide.

~~~
shawn
The most ironic part is that employees are convinced — totally convinced —
that they aren’t building that infrastructure.

It would be different if people had the self awareness to admit it and that
they were ok with it. But it’s either cowardly (afraid of peers’ reactions) or
somewhat delusional.

I wince to express this, but I’m at least happy to be living in America. For
all its flaws, it feels like the founders really did see this type of
situation coming and did the best they could to give us _some_ tools to defend
against it. Other places have fewer.

Still, those tools seem to be eroding with time.

~~~
deegles
I struggle with the idea that for every programmer that finds it unethical to
build weapons or surveillance software, there are others that believe it is
their patriotic duty to do so (or at least enough to get those projects done).

~~~
shawn
Eh. It would be better not to make people feel afraid for expressing those
views. I held them once, before NSA’s bad behavior came to light. In many ways
I still do.

The argument goes like this: any student of war will tell you that the most
important factor in warfare is intelligence. Strength is of course a
requirement, but it’s secondary. It was why Japan was defeated at Midway, for
example — that situation arose only because we knew for a fact what their
plans were, thanks to breaking their comms.

In that light, since humans seem no different from a hundred years ago till
now, it seems rather better to be top dog than to be someone else’s dog. And
that makes it my duty to keep my country firmly in that place.

... at least, that’s how I felt growing up. Those feelings have translated
more into “we have to be in this for each other, not for governments.” It
feels like the Internet is one of the last bastions of true freedom — free
from employers, free from identity. You can even make a fortune if you’re
sufficiently lucky and talented.

It feels hollow, though. Part of the reason for the feelings I expressed above
was that it fulfills a deep primal desire to be a part of something greater
than yourself, to be aligned to a common goal, something more than just
chasing a paycheck.

I wrote this mainly to give some context about how someone might be ok with
the idea of building surveillance software, but feelings are always a complex
and multifaceted thing. And we’re all still learning what it means to be human
and to contextualize our place in the world. Is this really the best way to
spend our time? And yet we’re forced to, if someone else has a club they want
to club you with.

One closing point: the best way to change an organization is from the inside.
If someone was truly worried about the NSA, joining them seems like one of the
most effective things you could do. Because you truly believe it could be a
tool of good, rather than a dystopaian weapon. There’s a reason idealists like
Snowden were attracted to the job.

I hope this wasn’t too philosophical. Mostly it’s just hard to determine what
you should even do with your life. It feels like no matter what you do, there
will be people who hate it. So why bother defending your own point of view?
Yet that feels like a cheap way out.

------
rkrzr
> In Western democracies, police and intelligence agencies are using the same
> surveillance tools to solve and deter crimes and prevent terrorism (see
> Technology Quarterly). The results are effective, yet deeply worrying.

These claims seem completely unfounded. It always surprises me when well-known
outlets like The Economist just make assertions like this, without having any
data to back it up. Of course the governments implementing the surveillance
regimes will claim that it's effective, but it's the media's job to actually
verify the veracity of these claims. Instead they are just parroting this
tired old narrative.

~~~
Fricken
Cops surveil, that's their job. Why would the economist need to back this up?
There is nothing extraordinary about that claim in any way whatsoever.

~~~
wilsonnb2
> police and intelligence agencies are using the same surveillance tools to
> solve and deter crimes and prevent terrorism

> Cops surveil, that's their job

These statements are not equivalent. No one is disputing that cops surveil
people. The question is, are they using the same tools that China is? That's
what the person you're respnding to thinks the Economist needs to back up.

~~~
7VfxmO50yo4y
I think even that is not entirely accurate. The comment by rkrzr rather was
about the tools being _effective_ :

> Of course the governments implementing the surveillance regimes will claim
> that it's effective, but it's the media's job to actually verify the
> veracity of these claims.

------
baybal2
Be worried. If NSA's work was to any extend genuinely relates to _foreign_
intelligence gathering, they would not be prowling through web diaries
American teenage girls. How you think they were supposed to look for Ben
Ladens on _American_ facebook.com and myspace.

Moreover, Snowden's powerpoints confirmed eager cooperation from all major US
dotcoms, with facebook's early ex-CTO nearing to publicly admitting that NSLs
they received were about "get raw DB access" which I assume they still have,
and use up to this day.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
The USG is able to lawfully conduct domestic surveillance of citizens with
security clearance. It is trivial to turn that panopticon on to the rest of
the populace.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
Of all the dogs the ATF has shot and all the doors the FBI has wrongfully
kicked down how many of them belonged to people who are part of a three letter
agency?

Enforcement organizations treating their own like they treat normal people is
the rare exception to the rule.

There are many lines drawn. The thin blue one just happens to have the most
brand recognition among the people on the wrong side of all the lines.

------
prophesi
For an in-depth look on surveillance in the States, I recommend @War[0]. It
delves into the rise of the NSA and the role of digital surveillance in modern
warfare, along with the NSA's relationship with large corporations to achieve
these goals.

[0] [https://www.amazon.com/War-Rise-Military-Internet-
Complex/dp...](https://www.amazon.com/War-Rise-Military-Internet-
Complex/dp/0544570286)

------
dsfyu404ed
The problem isn't the surveillance. Surveillance is just modern technology
being applies as a means to an end. History shows that you can't stand in the
way of technological progress for very long unless you're willing to be an
authoritarian police state to do it).

The problem I see it is one of a divided society. The people who create and
operate the laws and the surveillance dragnets do not worry about being
subject to them in their fullest.

Politicians will argue for gun control, enact laws that erode our freedoms,
half-ass healthcare and approve funding for surveillance dragnets that will be
used to make an end run around civil liberties. In the back of their minds
they know that they have armed security, that no enforcement agency will risk
using those laws to abuse politicians, they don't have to worry about
healthcare and they can afford a good lawyer to convince the court that their
civil liberties have been violated.

The people and organizations that actually implement these bad things don't
rock the boat because when you're on the inside whatever bad thing it is
doesn't apply to you. Cops are exempt from gun laws. The three letter agencies
don't use secret courts to handle issues with their own personnel and don't
send information requests and gag orders to each other. People in the
healthcare industry know how all the tricks to play and strings to pull to get
themselves good enough coverage at a fair price. The agencies operating the
stingrays, using ALPRs to catch people with weed on their way out of states
where it's legal, kicking down doors and shooting people's dogs don't have to
worry about being subject to it themselves because of the thin blue line. And
all these people's salary depend on them not rocking the boat over the fact
that they enjoy some perk that is not available to the peasantry at large.

If all the bad authoritarian crap society does was done to everyone with at
least a token attempt at being impartial we'd do a hell of a lot less of it.

------
api
The West invented this stuff, though our implementation is less centralized
and relies much more heavily on the private sector. The Chinese are just
copying it.

------
lgleason
Wait until they use this to enforce transgressions against thought crime in
the US...

~~~
wu-ikkyu
Thought crime/punishment seems to be increasingly prevalent and strongly
enforced by internet mobs and corporate censorship bots

------
seren
Amesys, a western society, has sold a surveillance system to Gaddafi, and is
still selling to dubious actors.

[http://www.telerama.fr/monde/amesys-egyptian-trials-and-
trib...](http://www.telerama.fr/monde/amesys-egyptian-trials-and-tribulations-
of-a-french-digital-arms-dealer,160452.php)

~~~
dqpb
Amesys is a western society?

~~~
yardie
Society is the french word for company.

------
reaperducer
This article is a week old.

The timing of it on HN smacks of the discussion from last month based on the
NYT article that the Chinese government employs people to patrol internet
discussion forums and write "America is just as bad!" posts to distract people
every time an article comes out that paints China in a negative light.

~~~
bilbo0s
It's probably more advisable just to flag this discussion if you believe it is
Chinese, American, European, Russian, liberal, conservative, (whatever else)
political propaganda.

Of course, most of HN is political propaganda lately, but that's a separate
issue.

------
cryoshon
echoes? the only element we're missing is making widespread arrests using the
data that's harvested.

to be clear, we're still making many arrests and incarcerating far more of our
people than anywhere else in the world -- just using criminally exploitative
drug policy as our "gotcha" more than technology, for the moment.

the economist sees "echoes" of the police state in the west. i see the same
song played in a different key and a less manic tempo.

------
ivl
I'm not sure it matters, so much as do people in the West have the option to
vote it down. Seems that's been slow to happen.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
You can't vote against executive policies that nobody in Congress is brave
enough to reign in.

------
awat
History doesnt repeat itself but it rhymes.

~~~
gr3yh47
America was born, nay, torn out of a monarchy

when independence was our declaration conveyance

it formed a republic with a twist of democracy

power to the people's voice was it's purveyance

today the people blindly march toward oligarchy

as we for free products provide our own surveillance

and I long for the future Just and Loving theocracy

When those in Christ know God fully in unveiled valence.

~~~
bilbo0s
And that valence will have to be unveiled.

The surveillance will demand it.

------
flanbiscuit
Interesting that this shows up on HN today because I was just reading a
thread[1] on reddit where a user was forced to install spyware on their
android phone when crossing into this region of China

Also I had no idea what was happening in that region. This[2] is from one of
the commenters in that thread:

> As someone from Xinjiang and migrated with my family to somewhere else, This
> is only a small part of the whole oppression and violation of human rights
> going on in North Western China. Now a days, Uyghurs students are not
> allowed to speak their mother tongue in schools, fasting during Ramadan is
> considered "politically incorrect"(let alone praying etc), and you will end
> up in "re-educational camp"(aka prisons). Uyghur females are forced to marry
> Chinese mans, as part of CCP's assimilation process, almost one million
> Uyghurs has been locked up in prisons, EVERY SINGLE successful Uyghur
> businessmans has been locked up, influencial figures like artists, scholar,,
> singers has gone into "political re-educational camps" too, many getting
> their organs harvested, and CCP sell them in the black market. Many healthy
> teenagers dies after being released from those camps, due to being some
> essential part of their body organs being harvested. The international
> community knows very little about everything happening in Xinjiang because
> Uyghurs don't have an vocal enough exiled leader like Dali Lama, and also
> because NO media is allowed inside Xinjiang, especially foreign media, if
> you have friends and family that have interests in Chinese culture or China
> as a country, I hope you guys can spread the message and things happening in
> Xinjiang, China, towards Uyghur people. Its comparable to the Holocaust,
> just done very low profile, I really mean it. It has past the point of
> making me angry, I just feel extremely depressed when I read things
> happening back home, and talking about them. Im just glad myself and all my
> family members are in a safe and free country now. If you wanna learn more,
> you can visit Radio Free Asia's website, and they have section reporting on
> Uyghurs.

> Edit: I'm sorry if this is getting political, I by no means saying that this
> has anything to do with average Chinese citizens and Chinese people, most of
> Chinese people I've seen and work with are all very humble really nice
> people, I'm only speaking out towards Chinese Communist Party, and please
> don't get too political under the comments,and I just want to give some
> background information of why CCP installating malware on people's phone is
> a common phenomenon in China (especially places like Xinjiang). Please be
> nice to each other, regardless of ethnicity or any differences.

1\.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/security/comments/8ofiiw/chinese_bo...](https://www.reddit.com/r/security/comments/8ofiiw/chinese_border_police_installed_software_on_my/)

2\.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/security/comments/8ofiiw/chinese_bo...](https://www.reddit.com/r/security/comments/8ofiiw/chinese_border_police_installed_software_on_my/e05qaib/)

~~~
analyst74
It started off sounding authentic and believable, then went to the crazy side
with claims of organ harvesting and forcing Xinjiang girls to marry Chinese
men.

------
sandworm101
>> Citizens of liberal democracies do not expect to be frisked without good
cause, or have their homes searched without a warrant.

Lol. What world does this author live in? I expect to be frisked every time I
go to an airport or football game. I expect to have to turn my pockets out
every time I cross the US-canada boarder. I'm not a minority, but I assume
some who are will want to add to this train of thought re being frisked by
cops.

And a warrant to search my home? Warrants are pieces of paper. Cops drive
tanks and carry machine guns. Whether they bothered to phone a magistrate for
permission before hand is the least of my concerns as they break down my door.
Warrants only matter if they are going to charge me with something and want
evidence admitted in court. Even then, there are so many exceptions. The
evidence gets in. My concern isn't about paperwork, it's that I'll be swatted
one night and they will shoot my dog.

Also, the "warrant requirement" is an American construct. It isn't a thing in
places like Canada, which most would consider a very liberal democracy.
Canadian cops can use evidence even if seized illegally. Nor do they have to
stop questioning you if you demand a lawyer. Nor do you get a jury trial.
Don't assume that all western democracies use the American legal system.

~~~
HillaryBriss
your comment touches on something i often wonder about: the differences
between US civil rights and the civil rights in our liberal democratic allies
(e.g. Canada, the UK, France, et al).

i had no idea that in Canada of all places "cops can use evidence even if
seized illegally."

i do know, however, that government censorship of the media is permissible in
the UK.

there's no single definition of "democracy" across the world.

it's interesting that some in the US seem to think that, if an individual
right is ever modified or restricted in the US, it means we're at "the end of
democracy." while, at the same time, these very same rights are routinely
restricted in other countries but we still consider those countries to be
"democracies."

~~~
gruez
>i had no idea that in Canada of all places "cops can use evidence even if
seized illegally."

according to [1], it's not a blanket yes or no. it's a balance of whichever
choice would make the justice system look worse. ie. turning someone's home
up-side down to find 1g of weed vs a serial murderer getting away with murder
because the judge didn't fill out the paperwork properly.

[1]
[https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Canadian_Criminal_Procedure_an...](https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Canadian_Criminal_Procedure_and_Practice/Search_and_Seizure/Print_version#General_Principles_9)

~~~
rikkus
That's quite a cynical way of explaining this. Is it possible to interpret
this as it being allowed to use evidence seized illegally if, on balance,
justice would be better served?

