[Senate Prints 116-47]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
116th Congress } { S. Prt.
COMMITTEE PRINT
2d Session } { 116-47
_______________________________________________________________________
THE NEW BIG BROTHER--CHINA AND DIGITAL AUTHORITARIANISM
__________
A MINORITY STAFF REPORT
PREPARED FOR THE USE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
One Hundred Sixteenth Congress
SECOND SESSION
July 21, 2020
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
Available via World Wide Web:
http://www.govinfo.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
42-356 PDF WASHINGTON : 2020
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho, Chairman
MARCO RUBIO, Florida ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland
CORY GARDNER, Colorado JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire
MITT ROMNEY, Utah CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware
LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina TOM UDALL, New Mexico
JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut
ROB PORTMAN, Ohio TIM KAINE, Virginia
RAND PAUL, Kentucky EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts
TODD YOUNG, Indiana JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon
TED CRUZ, Texas CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey
DAVID PERDUE, Georgia
Christopher M. Socha, Staff Director
Jessica Lewis, Democratic Staff Director
John Dutton, Chief Clerk
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Letter of Transmittal............................................ v
Preface on the Coronavirus....................................... ix
Executive Summary................................................ 1
Chapter 1: Building the Model for Digital Authoritarianism Inside
China.......................................................... 5
The Surveillance State: How China Tracks its Citizens........ 6
The Censorship Apparatus: Exploiting and Blocking Digital
Content.................................................... 13
The Legal System: China's Implementation of Authoritarian
Cyber Laws................................................. 16
China's Investment in Technologies Predicated on
Authoritarian Principles................................... 19
Chapter 2: Exporting Digital Authoritarianism--China on the
Global Cyber Stage............................................. 23
Exporting Technologies and Expanding Digital Authoritarianism 24
Case Study: Venezuela.................................... 29
Case Study: Central Asia................................. 31
Case Study: Ecuador...................................... 31
Case Study: Zimbabwe..................................... 33
A Global Challenge........................................... 33
Chapter 3: Institutionalizing Digital Authoritarianism--China at
International Fora............................................. 37
The United Nations........................................... 38
World Trade Organization..................................... 40
World Internet Conference.................................... 41
International Standards-Setting Bodies....................... 43
Chapter 4: Conclusions and Recommendations....................... 47
Recommendations.............................................. 49
Annex 1: Understanding the Trump Cyberspace Policy.............. 53
National Security Policy Documents........................... 53
Administration Efforts....................................... 55
Annex 2: The United States and 5G................................ 61
(iii)
Letter of Transmittal
----------
United States Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC, July 21, 2020.
Dear Colleagues: The growth and development of the digital
domain worldwide has fundamentally changed how individuals,
companies, and nations interact, work, and communicate--and
with it the structure of global governance. Digitally-enabled
technologies ranging from the Internet to mobile communications
to emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, are
accelerating the transmittal and receiving of information,
enabling greater trade interactions and economic development,
securing communications for our military and our allies, and
aiding in the development of even newer, more capable
technologies, amongst many other benefits. The United States
has not only played a primary role in developing these new
technologies, but it has worked to ensure the digital domain
operates with openness, stability, reliability,
interoperability, security, and respect for human rights.
These principles are under threat from authoritarian
regimes, however, which see the advent of new technologies in a
far more sinister light: as a means of surveilling and
controlling populations, stifling the free flow of information,
ensuring the survival of their governments, and as tools for
malign influence campaigns worldwide. While multiple
authoritarian governments have begun to utilize the digital
domain in this manner, the People's Republic of China is at the
forefront of developing and expanding a new, different, and
deeply troubling governance model for the digital domain:
digital authoritarianism.
The rise of this new and worrying model of digital
authoritarianism holds the potential to fundamentally alter the
character of the digital domain. The People's Republic of China
is pressing forward--at times with astounding speed and focus--
to build and expand digital authoritarianism through economic,
political, diplomatic, and coercive means at home and abroad.
The Chinese Communist Party is fostering digital
authoritarianism within China's borders by developing an
intrusive, omnipresent surveillance state that uses emerging
technologies to track individuals with greater efficiency and
bolstering its censorship apparatus to ensure information
considered detrimental to the regime does not reach its
citizens.
(v)
The government is shaping a legal system to strengthen the
Party's manipulation of the tools of digital authoritarianism
and expending vast sums of money to prop up Chinese companies
that develop products that enable its authoritarian governance
model. On the international level, China is exporting digitally
enabled products and the training and expertise to other
countries in an attempt to sway other nations to adopt this
alternative, authoritarian model for the digital domain. As we
have seem time and time again, with examples ranging from
Marriott's pull-down menu to the NBA to Zoom's suspension of
U.S. host accounts, China is seeking to utilize its newfound
clout to reshape the rules of the road in cyberspace away from
a free, unfettered, and secure environment to one that
facilitates the growth of authoritarianism.
The United States, as the leader of the free world, must
stand up for the principles and values that animate the
international community and push back against the expansion of
digital authoritarianism, using our economic prowess, unmatched
innovative and scientific spirit, and ability to bring like-
minded countries together. If the United States fails to lead
the international community in assuring that governance of the
digital domain is consistent with principles and values that
benefit all, then it will be China, not the international
community at large, which will shape the future of the digital
domain.
Given the critical importance of this issue for the future
of global governance--and the clear need for the United States
to reassert leadership within this space--I directed Senate
Foreign Relations Committee staffers Michael Schiffer and
Daniel Ricchetti to conduct a comprehensive study of China's
effort to build and expand its model for digital
authoritarianism and lay out recommendations for the U.S.
government to consider. The report uses primary document
research, news and subject-matter analysis, and interviews from
both former government officials and nongovernmental experts. I
want to thank Doug Levinson, Laura Truitt, Nina Russell,
Nadhika Ramachandran, Elizabeth Shneider, and the SFRC
Democratic Staff for their work on this report. I would also
like to thank Julie Smith, Amy Studdart, and Tommy Ross for
reviewing this report and the Congressional Research Service
for their contributions.\1\
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\1\ The conclusions of the report do not necessarily reflect the
views of the Congressional Research Service.
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The report's comprehensive analysis of China's digital
authoritarianism describes how the People's Republic of China
is successfully developing and implementing its malign
governance model internally and, increasingly, making inroads
with other countries to also embrace its new digital doctrine.
It further illustrates how the expansion of digital
authoritarianism in China and abroad has drastic consequences
for U.S. and allied security interests, the promotion of human
rights, and the future stability of cyberspace. Consequently,
the report calls for a series of both Congressional and
Executive actions designed to counter China's efforts to expand
its model of digital authoritarianism; to strengthen U.S.
technological innovation; and, to reinvigorate our diplomatic
endeavors around the globe on digital issues. I believe these
recommendations are readily available for adoption and
implementation by both Democrats and Republicans. Without
bipartisan support and the full backing of the United States
government, the American people will be far less secure in the
digital domain in the years ahead, see a further breakdown of
fundamental human rights, and witness the erosion of a free,
stable, reliable, and secure digital domain while China's
digital authoritarianism is allowed to flourish. American
leadership on these issues has been sorely lacking the past
three years. It is my sincere hope that this report will serve
as a useful bipartisan rallying point for my colleagues in
Congress so that we can work together to arrest the erosion of
our position and to reassert American leadership and values on
the world stage.
Sincerely,
Robert Menendez,
Ranking Member.
Preface on the Coronavirus
----------
When the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Democratic
Staff was first tasked with drafting this report, a consensus
was emerging that the January 2018 National Defense Strategy's
depiction of the ``reemergence of long-term strategic
competition'' against such great power rivals as Russia and
China would indeed be the ``central challenge'' to U.S.
interests and security for the balance of the twenty-first
century.\2\ The Trump administration's characterization of the
United States and China entering a ``new era of strategic
competition'' received broad bipartisan support in the Senate
as a largely accurate characterization--even if significant
differences remained about how to structure U.S. national
security policy accordingly.
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\2\ Secretary of Defense James Mattis, Summary of the 2018 National
Defense Strategy of the United States of America: Sharpening the
American Military's Competitive Edge, U.S. Department of Defense, Jan.
2018, at 2.
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Moreover, the suites of new and emergent digital
technologies that are remaking the face of the U.S. and the
global economies--including 5G infrastructure, social media,
block-chain, digital surveillance, and genomics and
biotechnology--are all widely acknowledged as being on the
cutting edge of this new competition and fundamental for U.S.
national security in the twenty-first century. Concerns
regarding these emergent technologies are embedded in questions
about the different, and competing, governance models for their
use and control. These differing governance models are shaped
by the form and nature of democratic and authoritarian states,
which are continually developing, innovating, and operating in
the digital space. Areas of competition between democratic and
authoritarian states therefore encompass concerns about secure
supply chains, privacy, human rights, standards, and the rules
of the road for how these technologies would be used by the
international community, including sharp power practices for
technologies that shape and negotiate culture, education, and
the media and are situated at the intersection of diplomacy,
influence, and technology.
This report primarily examines how China's repressive
government is creating a model of digital authoritarianism for
the digital space and what it is doing to both strengthen the
model in its own country and expand it internationally.
However, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in December 2019
has raised a new set of questions about the state and nature of
security challenges facing the United States in the twenty-
first century, great power competition, and the diffusion and
distribution of power in the international system. Moreover,
the COVID-19 pandemic has stimulated
(ix)
additional questions about the governance of new and emergent
digital technologies and the ways in which democratic and
authoritarian states will seek to use them, for good or ill.
Due to the fact that research, outside interviews, and the vast
majority of the drafting of this report occurred before the
outbreak of COVID-19, this report does not delve into how the
novel coronavirus is shaping or may shape the future of the
digital space as it pertains to digital authoritarianism.
However, the connection between COVID-19 and digital
authoritarianism is an important subject to examine in the
future. This preface is intended to signal the significance of
this topic and provide a brief roadmap for what issues may
arise moving forward.
One key issue regarding COVID-19 and the digital space is
that several democratic states, including South Korea and
Taiwan, have adopted privacy practices to combat COVID-19 that
previously were regarded as overbearing, all in the service of
public health and responsive governance.\3\ Meanwhile, China's
extensive use of surveillance technologies, both to manage its
own COVID-19 outbreak and to continue suppressing internal
dissent and exerting control in Xinjiang and Tibet, has only
served to exemplify the malign use of these tools in the hands
of a government that is not answerable to its people. In many
cases, the underlying technology and platforms used by
different governments are the same or largely similar; it is
governance models, political culture, transparency, norms of
behavior, and the rule of law that separate the public good
from political oppression. Questions regarding the use of these
technologies have become only more serious, and the
implications more clear, in the face of the pandemic.
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\3\ Anthony Kuhn, ``South Korea's Tracking Of COVID-19 Patients
Raises Privacy Concerns,'' NPR, May 2, 2020; Milo Hsieh, ``Coronavirus:
Under surveillance and confined at home in Taiwan,'' BBC, Mar. 24,
2020.
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Furthermore, these questions are not confined to matters of
domestic policy. As the COVID-19 pandemic has progressed, an
intense competition for global influence has emerged, with
China and Russia seeking to use their digital toolkits to
exploit the debates over the public health challenges the
pandemic has created in the United States, Europe, and
elsewhere. The purpose of controlling such a narrative is to
make democracy look less attractive than a ``capable''
authoritarian model and to use the pandemic to attack the
fabric of the democratic system itself.
As the COVID-19 pandemic has all too well illustrated, the
brave new world of digital technological use and misuse is
already upon us, and policymakers now need to move quickly to
determine what sort of people--and what sort of governance--we
will have in it.
Executive Summary
----------
In an era in which rising authoritarianism is working to
undermine the fabric of democratic institutions globally, the
Internet and connected technologies represent a continually
evolving domain that will fundamentally shape the future of
politics, economics, warfare, and culture. Cyberspace remains
relatively undefined and open to new rulemaking,
standardization, and development. The United States has been
and remains the premier digital innovator on the globe, and as
such the primary entity capable of shaping the future of the
digital environment. However, China's rapid rise in key fields,
investment in new digital technologies, efforts abroad, and
attempts at dominating international rule-making bodies are
positioning it to erode the United States' leadership on
technological issues and reconfigure the standards of the
domain away from free, democratic values.
China has the largest number of Internet users on the
planet, with more than 800 million Chinese citizens connected
to some form of Internet.\4\ Chinese technology companies such
as Huawei and ZTE are at the forefront of developing and
implementing fifth-generation (5G) telecommunications
infrastructure. Chinese patent publications have surged in
emerging technology fields such as artificial intelligence
(AI), machine learning, and deep learning.\5\ China's Belt and
Road Initiative (BRI) contains an effort ``to create a `digital
Silk Road' that will allow it to shape the future of the global
Internet--and reinforce the Chinese Communist Party's
leadership at home for decades to come.''\6\ These endeavors
underline that China understands the importance of the digital
domain to its domestic political stability and economic,
political, and military rise, and wants to lead the globe in
shaping the future of the digital world. It further
demonstrates that China is executing a long-term plan to
dominate the digital space.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ Francois Godement et al., ``The China Dream Goes Digital:
Technology in the Age of Xi,'' European Council of Foreign Relations,
Oct. 25, 2018; ``China has 854 mln internet users: report,'' Xinhua,
Aug. 30, 2019.
\5\ World Intellectual Property Organization, WIPO Technology
Trends 2019: Artificial Intelligence (Geneva: World Intellectual
Property Organization, 2019), at 32; Louise Lucas & Richard Waters,
``China and US Compete to Dominate Big Data,'' Financial Times, May 1,
2018.
\6\ Stewart M. Patrick & Ashley Feng, ``Belt and Router: China Aims
for Tighter Internet Controls with Digital Silk Road,'' The
Internationalist (blog), Council of Foreign Relations, July 2, 2018,
https://www.cfr.org/blog/belt-and-router-china-aims-tighter-internet-
controls-digital-silk-road; ``Vision and Actions on Jointly Building
Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road,'' National
Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Foreign and Affairs and
Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China, with State
Council Authorization, March 2015, https://bit.ly/33aU0vJ.
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While China's rise in the digital space is concerning to
the United States in and of itself, an additional pressing
issue facing not only the United States but the free world at
large is how China is influencing and reshaping the Internet in
its own political image. China's government structure can be
defined as a repressive, authoritarian regime. In its 2020
Freedom of the World ratings, Freedom House labeled China as
``not free'' and described the regime as ``increasingly
repressive in recent years.''\7\ Despite China's authoritarian
style of governing, the country's rise as a major economic and
political player in the international sphere is providing the
communist regime with increased status among other nations. As
journalist Richard McGregor notes, China is pushing ``the idea
that authoritarian political systems are not only legitimate
but can outperform Western democracies.''\8\ China's growing
influence on the digital sphere is no different, as it enables
China to promote an alternative model for the digital domain
based on state control.
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\7\ ``Freedom of the World 2020: China,'' Freedom House, https://
freedomhouse.org/country/china/freedom-world/2020 (last visited May 20,
2020).
\8\ Richard McGregor, ``Xi Jinping's Ideological Ambitions,'' The
Wall Street Journal, Mar. 2, 2018.
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----------
Definition:
Digital Authoritarianism--The use of ICT products and
services to surveil, repress, and manipulate domestic
and foreign populations.\9\
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\9\ See, e.g., Alina Polyakova & Chris Meserole, ``Exporting
Digital Authoritarianism: The Russian and Chinese Models,'' The
Brookings Institution, Aug. 2019.
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----------
This model stands in stark contrast to what the United
States and its allies espouse: a free and open Internet that
encourages the free flow of information and commerce in ways
that advance innovation and market-driven economic growth.
Increasingly, other foreign nations, including Ecuador, Serbia,
Zimbabwe, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Pakistan have or are
looking to acquire Chinese information and communications
technologies (ICT) and integrate them into their national
infrastructures, opening up potential opportunities for
abuse.\10\ China's efforts to advance and proliferate its ICT
hardware and systems, both in China and overseas, represent not
only a desire to continually expand its economy, but also a
push to establish, expand, internationalize, and
institutionalize a model for digital governance that this
report describes as ``digital authoritarianism.''\11\
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\10\ Paul Mozur et al., ``Made in China, Exported to the World: The
Surveillance State,'' The New York Times, Apr. 24, 2019; Abdi Latif
Dahir, ``China is exporting its digital surveillance methods to African
countries,'' Quartz Africa, Nov. 1, 2018; Yau Tsz Yan, ``China taking
Big Brother to Central Asia,'' Eurasianet, Sept. 6, 2019, https://
eurasianet.org/china-taking-big-brother-to-central-asia; ``Chinese
facial recognition tech installed in nations vulnerable to abuse,'' CBS
News, Oct. 16, 2019; Justin Sherman, ``U.S. Diplomacy Is a Necessary
Part of Countering China's Digital Authoritarianism,'' Lawfare, Mar.
17, 2020, https://www.lawfareblog.com/us-diplomacy-necessary-part-
countering-chinas-digital-authoritarianism.
\11\ Alina Polyakova & Chris Meserole, ``Exporting Digital
Authoritarianism: The Russian and Chinese Models,'' The Brookings
Institution, Aug. 2019.
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China's rise as a key player in the digital domain that
uses its influence to promote digital authoritarianism presents
fundamental security, privacy, and human rights concerns for
the United States and the international community at large.
Most troubling, China is working to undermine our democratic
institutions and values. Due to the fundamental risks
associated with the rise of China's digital authoritarianism,
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC) Democratic Staff
examined the subject for the past year in an effort to provide
a holistic study of the threats posed to the United States, our
allies, and the international community. As part of its
analysis, SFRC Democratic Staff reviewed primary source
materials including reports, studies, and official Chinese
government releases, as well as news sources, and conducted
interviews with former U.S. government officials and non-
governmental experts who work in the fields of human rights,
technology, cybersecurity or China policy.
The examination conducted by SFRC Democratic Staff offers
concerning insights about how China is leveraging new
technologies to assert increased control over its population
and strengthening its ties with other nations around the globe.
This report underscores, for example, how China's government
employs facial recognition technology and big data analysis
tools to identify, discriminate, incarcerate, and ``re-
educate'' Uyghurs living in Xinjiang, essentially creating a
police state that flouts basic human rights and civil
liberties. China is not just using these tools at home; it is
also working to export its high-tech tools and authoritarian
principles throughout the globe. While these examples are
emblematic of the rise of China's digital authoritarianism, the
fundamental takeaway of this report is that if left unchecked,
China, not the U.S. and our allies, will write the rules of the
digital domain, opening the doors for digital authoritarianism
to govern the Internet and associated technologies.
This report provides an incisive examination of the key
aspects of China's digital authoritarianism, the insidious
nature of its proliferation inside China, the damage it is
causing around the globe, and proposed legislative solutions
and other measures the United States could adopt.
In Chapter 1, the report describes China's internal model
for digital authoritarianism and how China implements digital
authoritarianism domestically. The chapter is divided into four
subsections, with each subsection highlighting a specific
aspect of China's digital authoritarianism model. The first
subsection deals with China's ``surveillance state,'' including
how China utilizes artificial intelligence, facial recognition
technologies, biometrics, surveillance cameras, and big data
analytics to profile and categorize individuals quickly, track
movements, predict activities, and preemptively take action
against those considered a threat in both the real world and
online. The second subsection looks into China's digital
censorship apparatus and the tools that the Chinese government
uses to control flows of data, such as the use of the ``Great
Firewall'' to oversee information and block foreign technology
platforms in China. The third subsection delves into China's
legal system and how the government is implementing new laws
that further strengthen the government apparatus that allows
China's digital authoritarianism to flourish. Lastly,
subsection four studies China's massive investments in
companies that develop new technologies that are both
predicated on and aid China's authoritarian principles.
Chapter 2 examines how China is exporting its digital
technologies around the globe as a means of increasing its
influence in other nations and, more dangerously, expanding the
technologies and methods used for digital authoritarianism.
This chapter looks at (1) China's export of underlying digital
infrastructure technologies and (2) China's global
proliferation of systems and technologies that run on those
digital infrastructure technologies, thus advancing China's
model for social control. Additionally, the chapter provides
case studies of countries around the globe to demonstrate how
China is integrating its technologies into these countries and
how said integration impacts each nation.
Chapter 3 details China's efforts at strengthening its
involvement and influence in intergovernmental fora. The
chapter looks into how China is increasingly using fora such as
the United Nations (UN), World Trade Organization (WTO), and
other standards-setting bodies to push a Chinese-centric
digital domain. China's involvement in these bodies is directly
impacting the future rules of the road for cyberspace, and at a
time when the United States seems to be receding from its
traditional role as leader of the free world, China is filling
the gap.
Chapter 4 elucidates the report's conclusions and policy
recommendations. The recommendations focus on government
actions, especially by Congress, to address and counter China's
rise as a technological power and its desire to proliferate its
model of digital authoritarianism. This section recommends
legislation that establishes a public-private consortium aimed
at creating a United States 5G alternative to Chinese
technologies, legislation which institutes a Digital Rights
Promotion Fund to help organizations push back against China's
use and weaponization of mass surveillance, and legislation
that would found a cyber military service academy. The report
calls for the President to lead a coalition of countries to
counter China's digital authoritarianism and push for a free,
stable, unfettered, and secure digital domain. These
recommendations stem from the understanding that Congress has a
special responsibility, as the constitutionally mandated
lawmaking body of the United States, to develop and institute
laws that protect against the rise and spread of China and
digital authoritarianism. Such a role is especially important
at a time when the executive branch has done little to combat
digital authoritarianism, leaving the United States, our
allies, our partners, and the global community at risk from the
proliferation of digital authoritarianism.
This report contains two annexes. Annex 1 discusses the
Trump administration's various cyber efforts and how these
efforts have been deficient in countering China's continued
rise as both a global geopolitical player and technological
rival. Annex 2 provides an explanation of the 5G battle
occurring between the United States and China. This overview
highlights how China is attempting to dominate the 5G space and
the present gaps in U.S. policy regarding this critical issue.
Chapter 1: Building the Model for Digital Authoritarianism Inside China
----------
In his October 18, 2017 opening address to the 19th
National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP, or the
Party), General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and
President of the People's Republic of China (PRC) Xi Jinping
articulated a vision for restrictions in the digital domain. In
the address, Xi stated:
We will maintain the right tone in public communication
. . . We will provide more and better online content
and put in place a system for integrated internet
management to ensure a clean cyberspace. We will
implement the system of responsibility for ideological
work . . . distinguish between matters of political
principle, issues of understanding and thinking, and
academic viewpoints, but we must oppose and resist
various erroneous views with a clear stand.\12\
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\12\ Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party
(CCP) and President of the People's Republic of China (PRC), ``Secure a
Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All
Respects and Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese
Characteristics for a New Era,'' Speech Delivered at the 19th National
Congress of the Communist Party of China, Oct. 28, 2017, http://
www.xinhuanet.com/english/download/Xi--Jinping's--report--at--19th--
CPC--National--Congress.pdf.
Xi's statement shows the CCP's broad objective: bolstering
development of the Internet while mitigating the threats the
Internet poses to CCP rule. Xi placed particular emphasis on
the intent to ensure the CCP's control of ideas in cyberspace
by limiting access to information and ideas that run counter to
the Party's ideology. The promotion and preservation of CCP
control of China's own digital domain undergirds the CCP's
entire digital authoritarianism model. For the CCP to continue
moving towards its long-term objectives of becoming the
dominant player in the cyber domain and expanding its influence
abroad, it must first ensure that it has pacified Chinese
citizens and purged dissent. In simple terms, China's digital
authoritarianism starts at home.
To accomplish this goal, the CCP has developed a unique
model for digital authoritarianism implemented through a
combination of technologies, regulations, and policies in four
areas: (1) surveilling and tracking Chinese citizens, (2)
exploiting and blocking data and content stored or transmitted
on the digital domain, (3) implementing authoritarian cyber
laws, and (4) directing massive investments in new technologies
to secure the Party's future. The CCP uses these tools in
concert with one another to shape the Chinese digital domain
into a repressive, controlled space that stifles dissent,
controls individual movement, curtails expression, flouts basic
human rights for Chinese individuals, and helps enable and
sustain the CCP's authoritarian rule.
The Surveillance State: How China Tracks its Citizens
The CCP regime has long depended on its ability to track
and surveil China's population to ensure its survival and
promulgate its authoritarian rule. The Party has used various
methods to surveil individuals living in China since the
inception of the communist regime. Digital tools provide the
CCP with a range of new options that greatly enhance its
ability to monitor citizens, turning China into a surveillance
state. Emerging technologies such as facial recognition,
biometrics, and other cutting edge tools enable China to
profile and categorize individuals quickly in massive
quantities, track movements, and preemptively take action
against those considered a threat in both the real world and
online.\13\ The aforementioned technologies are combined with
repressive regulations and burgeoning, omnipresent monitoring
tools such as the Social Credit System currently being rolled
out by the Chinese state.\14\ This combination of technologies,
tools, and regulations creates a structure where practically
all citizens are surveilled, and those considered problematic
to the regime face massive civil and political repression,
including ``mass arbitrary detention, forced political
indoctrination, restrictions on movement, and religious
oppression'' as seen in Xinjiang.\15\
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\13\ See, e.g., Paul Mozur, ``One Month, 500,000 Face Scans: How
China is Using A.I. to Profile a Minority,'' The New York Times, Apr.
14, 2019; Josh Chin & Clement Burge, ``Twelve Days in Xinjiang: How
China's Surveillance State Overwhelms Daily Life,'' The Wall Street
Journal, Dec. 19, 2017.
\14\ 14 Christina Zhou and Bang Xiao, ``China's Social Credit
System is pegged to be fully operational by 2020but what will it look
like?,'' ABC News, Jan. 1, 2020; Hollie Russon Gilman & Daniel Benaim,
``China's Aggressive Surveillance Technology Will Spread Beyond Its
Borders,'' New America, Aug. 23, 2018, https://bit.ly/2ISFiSQ; Steve
Mollman, ``China's new weapon of choice is your face,'' Quartz, Oct. 5,
2019
\15\ Maya Wang, China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse
Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights
Watch, at 1 (May 2019); Steve Mollman, ``China's new weapon of choice
is your face,'' Quartz, Oct. 5, 2019; Hollie Russon Gilman & Daniel
Benaim, ``China's Aggressive Surveillance Technology Will Spread Beyond
Its Borders,'' New America, Aug. 23, 2018, https://bit.ly/2ISFiSQ.
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Facial recognition technology is a key tool used by the
Party to monitor citizens. Chinese authorities combine
traditional video surveillance with innovative big data
analytics tools to allow the government to monitor its 1.4
billion citizens.\16\ China is a world leader in the video
surveillance industry. For example, two Chinese companies, the
Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Company (Hikvision) and
the Zhejiang Dahua Technology Company (Dahua), together control
one-third of the global market for video surveillance.\17\
Companies such as Hikvision and Dahua have aided the buildout
of an extensive closed-circuit television (CCTV) infrastructure
in China.\18\ China currently is deploying more than 200
million cameras throughout the country, and an estimated 560
million are expected to be installed by 2021.\19\ The cameras
themselves are useful to Chinese authorities, but the
integration of cameras with burgeoning artificial intelligence
(AI) programs, which allows authorities to churn through
massive amounts of data and identify individuals more rapidly,
makes the system far more effective and repressive.\20\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\16\ World Bank, ``China,'' https://data.worldbank.org/country/
china (last visited Apr. 28, 2020).
\17\ Editorial, Konzept: 13 Tipping Points in 2018, Deutsche Bank
Research (January 2018), at 34, https://bit.ly/2UI0QEf.
\18\ Danielle Cave et al., ``Mapping more of China's tech giants:
AI and surveillance,'' Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Nov. 28,
2019, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/mapping-more-chinas-tech-giants;
Chris Buckley & Paul Mozur, ``How China Uses High-Tech Surveillance to
Subdue Minorities,'' The New York Times, May 22, 2019; Ben Dooley,
``Chinese Firms Cash in on Xinjiang's Growing Police State,'' Agence
France-Presse, June 27, 2018.
\19\ Amanda Lentino, ``This Chinese Facial Recognition Start-Up Can
Identify A Person in Seconds,'' CNBC, May 16, 2019; The Economist,
``China: Facial Recognition and State Control,'' Oct. 24, 2018, https:/
/www.youtube.com/watch?v=lH2gMNrUuEY (last visited Apr. 28, 2020);
Thomas Ricker, ``The US, like China, has about one surveillance camera
for every four people, says report,'' The Verge, Dec. 9, 2019, https://
bit.ly/35LjjGv.
\20\ Emily Feng, ``How China Is Using Facial Recognition
Technology,'' NPR, Dec. 16, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China is quickly emerging as a global leader in integrating
artificial intelligence and facial biometric data to bolster
surveillance capabilities. Chinese companies, ranging from
older industry stalwarts such as Hikvision to newer startups
like Yitu Technology (Yitu) and Megvii Technology Limited
(Megvii), are using emerging technologies to analyze vast
troves of images and information processed by cameras to
strengthen facial recognition programs.\21\ These programs
support the underlying capabilities used to develop the
databases that China's government and public security officials
draw on to identify and monitor individuals. The databases rely
on machine learning, a process in which ``engineers feed data
to artificial intelligence systems to train them to recognize
patterns or traits.''\22\ The technology, however, is still
imperfect. Accurate hits on recognizing individual faces depend
on environmental factors, including lighting and the
positioning of cameras.\23\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ Australian Strategic Policy Institute, ``Yitu,'' (last visited
June 5, 2020), https://chinatechmap.aspi.org.au/#/company/yitu;
Australian Strategic Policy Institute, ``Megvii,'' (last visited June
5, 2020), https://chinatechmap.aspi.org.au/#/company/megvii; Danielle
Cave et al., ``Mapping more of China's tech giants: AI and
surveillance,'' Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Nov. 28, 2019,
https://www.aspi.org.au/report/mapping-more-chinas-tech-giants.
\22\ Paul Mozur, ``One Month, 500,000 Face Scans: How China is
Using A.I. to Profile a Minority,'' The New York Times, Apr. 14, 2019.
\23\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Technical flaws have not dissuaded the Chinese government
from vastly expanding the scope and use of artificial
intelligence for policing and surveillance, and the
technology's efficacy continues to improve. The Chinese
government aims to have a video surveillance network that is
``omnipresent, fully networked, always working and fully
controllable'' by 2020.\24\ Chinese government investment in
these technologies is also slated to continue growing, with one
expert stating that China's police is preparing to ``spend an
additional $30 billion in the coming years on techno-enabled
snooping.''\25\ As China perfects these tools, it will acquire
even more invasive capabilities for surveilling its people.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\24\ Simon Denyer, ``China's Watchful Eye,'' The Washington Post,
Jan. 7, 2018.
\25\ Paul Mozur, ``Inside China's Dystopian Dreams: A.I., Shame and
Lots of Cameras,'' The New York Times, July 8, 2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The CCP further augments its surveillance system with other
important techniques that amplify surveillance capabilities.
Chinese officials throughout the country are collecting and
collating biometric data, such as DNA samples, fingerprints,
voice samples, and blood types.\26\ In a report on Xinjiang,
Human Rights Watch (HRW) wrote that collecting this information
``is part of the government's drive to form a `multi-modal'
biometric portrait of individuals and to gather ever more data
about its citizens.''\27\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\26\ Sigal Samuel, ``China is installing a secret surveillance app
on tourists' phones,'' Vox, July 3, 2019, https://bit.ly/3pJ2SCu; Sui-
Lee Wee, ``China Uses DNA to Track Its People, With the Help of
American Expertise,'' The New York Times, Feb. 21, 2019; Maya Wang,
China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse Engineering a Xinjiang Police
Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights Watch, at 15 (May 2019); Phoebe
Zhang, ``China `world's worst' for invasive use of biometric data,''
South China Morning Post, Dec. 5, 2019, https://bit.ly/2IXEg7X.
\27\ Maya Wang, China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse
Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights
Watch, at 15 (May 2019).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Chinese government has also extracted vast amounts of
private data by using technologies to monitor activities and
communications conducted over the Internet. For example,
Chinese authorities force specific mobile applications on
individuals in or entering Xinjiang.\28\ One of these apps,
Fengcai, downloads ``all your text messages, contacts, call log
history, calendar entries, and installed apps . . . this
sensitive data is then sent, unencrypted, to a local
server.''\29\ Chinese authorities employ Wi-Fi sniffers, which
collect unique identifying information of networked devices,
like laptops and smartphones, and can be used to read people's
emails.\30\ Each of these new technologies and mechanisms,
whether cutting-edge facial recognition software or a
smartphone app, offers Chinese authorities useful information
to help surveil the population. The consequences of China's
accelerated development of technologies to strengthen the
surveillance state are dire.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\28\ Sigal Samuel, ``China is Installing a Secret Surveillance App
on Tourists' Phones,'' Vox, July 3, 2019; Joseph Cox, ``China Is
Forcing Tourists to Install Text-Stealing Malware at its Border,''
Vice, July 2, 2019, https://bit.ly/2ITTPOy.
\29\ Sigal Samuel, ``China is Installing a Secret Surveillance App
on Tourists' Phones,'' Vox, July 3, 2019.
\30\ Charles Rollet, ``In China's Far West, Companies Cash in on
Surveillance Program that Targets Muslims,'' Foreign Policy, June 13,
2018; Human Rights Watch, ``Big Data Fuels Crackdown in Minority
Region,'' February 26, 2018, https://bit.ly/2Krjy1f.
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China's authoritarian use of surveillance technology is
particularly pervasive and intrusive in Xinjiang autonomous
region in northwest China. Xinjiang is home to 25 million
people, of which approximately eleven million are Muslim
Uyghurs.\31\ In this region, China has deployed its
surveillance apparatus on a massive scale in an effort to track
the population living there.\32\ While this apparatus affects
everyone in Xinjiang, it has disproportionately targeted
Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities. Chinese officials believe
Uyghurs hold ``extremist and separatist ideas.''\33\ China's
targeting has led to extreme political and religious repression
against these groups.\34\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\31\ Michael Hardy, ``In Xinjiang, Tourism Erodes the Last Traces
of Uyghur Culture,'' Wired, Apr. 4, 2020, https://www.wired.com/story/
xinjiang-uyghur-culture-tourism/; Bryan Wood & Brennan Butler, ``What
is happening with the Uighurs in China,'' PBS News Hour, Oct. 4, 2019.
\32\ Lindsay Maizland, ``China's Repression of Uighurs in
Xinjiang,'' Council on Foreign Relations, updated June 30, 2020,
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-repression-uighurs-xinjiang;
U.S. Department of State, ``2018 Report on International Religious
Freedom: China: Xinjiang,'' May 23, 2019, https://bit.ly/2KroAuF (last
visited July 10, 2020); Sheena Chestnut Greitens et al.,
``Understanding China's `preventive repression' in Xinjiang,'' The
Brookings Institution, Mar. 4, 2020.
\33\ Lindsay Maizland, ``China's Repression of Uighurs in
Xinjiang,'' Council on Foreign Relations, updated June 30, 2020,
https://on.cfr.org/348zRak.
\34\ Id.; U.S. Department of State, ``2018 Report on International
Religious Freedom: China: Xinjiang,'' May 23, 2019, https://bit.ly/
2KroAuF (last visited July 10, 2020); Sheena Chestnut Greitens et al.,
``Understanding China's `preventive repression' in Xinjiang,'' The
Brookings Institution, Mar. 4, 2020.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Since 2014, China has promulgated an extensive surveillance
ecosystem throughout Xinjiang as part of its ``Strike Hard
Campaign against Violent Terrorism.''\35\ China has placed a
large amount of surveillance equipment along streets and
neighborhoods, including at checkpoints in major metropolitan
zones. Chinese authorities use them primarily to monitor
Uyghurs.\36\ By combining the cameras with facial recognition
technology, Chinese authorities can increasingly track Uyghur
activity down to the individual level.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\35\ Charles Rollet, ``In China's Far West, Companies Cash in on
Surveillance Program that Targets Muslims,'' Foreign Policy, June 13,
2018; Jerome Doyon, ``Counter Extremism in Xinjiang: Understanding
China's Community-Focused Counter-Terrorism Tactics,'' War on the
Rocks, Jan. 14, 2019, https://bit.ly/2IXCPH0; Maya Wang et al.,
``Eradicating Ideological Viruses'': China's Campaign of Repression
Against Xinjiang's Muslims, Human Rights Watch, at 4 (Sept. 2018).
\36\ Chris Buckley et al., ``How China Turned a City into a
Prison,'' The New York Times, Apr. 4, 2019; Ben Westcott, ``Chinese
government loads surveillance app onto phones of visitors to Xinjiang:
report,'' CNN, July 3, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Omnipresent monitoring has essentially stifled Uyghur
freedom of movement in the region and eliminated any semblance
of personal privacy. Simple activities, such as an individual
tracked by a camera traversing farther than 300 meters from
designated safe areas (often designated as an individual's home
or workplace) triggers an alert to police of the individual's
movement.\37\ At key transit checkpoints, Chinese authorities
use face scans to determine whether Uyghurs can travel by
cross-referencing the photo taken at a checkpoint to internal
databases.\38\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\37\ Adile Ablet & Alim Seytoff, ``Authorities Testing Facial-
Recognition Systems in Uyghur Dominated Xinjiang Region,'' Radio Free
Asia, Jan. 25, 2018.
\38\ Darren Byler, ``I researched Uighur society in China for 8
years and watched how technology opened new opportunities--then became
a trap,'' The Conversation, Sept. 18, 2019, https://bit.ly/3nCySGo;
Paul Mozur, ``One Month, 500,000 Face Scans: How China is Using A.I. to
Profile a Minority,'' The New York Times, Apr. 14, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Surveillance also negatively affects Uyghurs' ability to
practice their faith freely. The Agence France-Presse found
that, in 2018, Hikvision won a contract for its cameras to
watch 967 mosques in Xinjiang's Moyu county alone, and that
authorities use these cameras to ``ensure that imams stick to a
`unified' government script.''\39\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\39\ Ben Dooley, ``Chinese Firms Cash in on Xinjiang's Growing
Police State,'' Agence France-Presse, June 27, 2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In addition to video surveillance, Uyghurs must accept
other repressive controls that impinge on their basic human
rights in order to not run afoul of authorities. From 2016 to
2017, Uyghurs were tricked into providing biometric data to
authorities as part of a misleading government health program
in Xinjiang labeled ``Physicals for All.''\40\ Tahir Imin, a
Muslim who participated in the health check, underscored the
repressive nature of the supposed health screenings, saying
that authorities told him he did not have the right to ask
about the test results after they drew his blood, scanned his
face, recorded his voice, and took his fingerprints.\41\ The
forced acquisition of Mr. Imin's physical and genetic data
underlines China's desire to scoop new data from those living
in Xinjiang and file it for future use.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\40\ Sui-Lee Wee, ``China Uses DNA to Track Its People, With the
Help of American Expertise,'' The New York Times, Feb. 21, 2019.
\41\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chinese public security authorities also vigorously monitor
telecommunications devices used by Uyghurs. Various news
outlets report that the Chinese government mandates Uyghurs
install an application on electronic devices that allows the
government to surveil their online activities, a fundamental
intrusion on online privacy.\42\ The application, called
JingWang, is specifically ``built with no safeguards in place
to protect the private, personally identifying information of
its users'' and capable of scanning and sending information
stored on a device to a remote server.\43\ While Chinese
authorities state that the purpose of the application is to
detect what authorities deem to be illegal terroristic or
religious material, Sophie Richardson, the China Director of
Human Rights Watch, rightly asserts that the application is
simply a new technical mechanism for gathering vast quantities
of data on people.\44\ The total effect of these systems is a
repressive, authoritarian regime designed to deprive Uyghurs
and other ethnic minorities of their rights, turning cities
such as Urumqi and Kashgar into veritable prison cities.\45\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\42\ Joseph Cox, ``Chinese Government Forces Residents To Install
Surveillance App With Awful Security,'' Vice, Apr. 9, 2018, https://
bit.ly/3kN8ecb
\43\ Id.
\44\ Joseph Cox, ``Chinese Government Forces Residents To Install
Surveillance App With Awful Security,'' Vice, Apr. 9, 2019, https://
www.vice.com/en--us/article/ne94dg/jingwang-app-no-encryption-china-
force-install-urumqi-xinjiang; Yi Shu Ng, ``China forces its Muslim
minority to install spyware on their phones,'' Mashable, July 21, 2017,
https://mashable.com/2017/07/21/china-spyware-xinjiang/#p2--q.Fw.DOqd.
\45\ See Chris Buckley et al., ``How China Turned a City into a
Prison,'' The New York Times, Apr. 4, 2019; Josh Chin & Clement Burge,
``Twelve Days in Xinjiang: How China's Surveillance State Overwhelms
Daily Life,'' The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 19, 2017.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The various elements of the surveillance apparatus in
Xinjiang on their own provide important data to Chinese
authorities, but it is the centralization and rapid recall of
the collected data that gives the authoritarian system
increasing control and power. This ability exists thanks in
large part to the digital nature of the surveillance system, in
which masses of data about individuals in Xinjiang are
collected into central databases and rendered quickly
retrievable by authorities, allowing them to uncover supposedly
concerning behavior or respond swiftly to a situation.
China uses this digital process in Xinjiang, with police
accessing information located on centralized servers from a
mobile application.\46\ The Integrated Joint Operations
Platform (IJOP) is a central system developed by a subsidiary
of China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CETC), a
major state-owned defense technology company in China. It
integrates information from different ``sources or machine
sensors,'' such as video surveillance cameras or stolen
Internet data, into ``a massive dataset of personal
information, and of police behavior and movements in
Xinjiang.''\47\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\46\ Maya Wang, China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse
Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights
Watch, at 21 (May 2019); Human Rights Watch, ``How Mass Surveillance
Works in Xinjiang, China,'' May 2, 2019, https://bit.ly/2IXsLxV (last
visited July 10, 2020).
\47\ Maya Wang, China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse
Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights
Watch, at 20 (May 2019).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The centralized IJOP database syncs with the IJOP app,
which authorities can access on a mobile device.\48\ IJOP
subsequently analyzes the data, although it is important to
note that the level in which big data analytics plays a role in
dissecting the data is unknown, and uses them to identify and
predict patterns of behavior and, when necessary, notify police
of people whom the data system categorizes as requiring
investigation or even detention.\49\ The IJOP app is the
mechanism authorities use to communicate with the central
information system and supplements the information going into
the IJOP system, providing what Human Rights Watch (HRW) China
Senior Researcher Maya Wang describes as ``three broad
functions: [the app] collects data, reports on suspicious
activities or circumstances, and prompts investigative
missions.''\50\ The IJOP sends alerts to police or government
authorities to investigate suspicious activity, and through the
app, authorities can send new information back to the IJOP,
providing even more data to the system.\51\ It is through this
cyclical, data-driven process that authorities in Xinjiang can
truly implement digital authoritarianism in the region, as the
sheer amount of information collected by authorities and the
ability to understand that information in detail offer the
Chinese government ``the possibility of real-time, all-
encompassing surveillance'' that flouts basic human rights to
privacy.\52\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\48\ Human Rights Watch, ``How Mass Surveillance Works in Xinjiang,
China,'' May 2, 2019, https://bit.ly/2IXsLxV (last visited July 10,
2020).
\49\ Maya Wang, China's Algorithms of Repression: Reverse
Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App, Human Rights
Watch, at 1, 19, 21, 22, 29 (May 2019).
\50\ Nazish Dholakia, Media Desk Officer, Human Rights Watch,
Interview with Maya Wang, ``Interview: China's `Big Brother' App,''
Human Rights Watch, May 1, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/05/01/
interview-chinas-big-brother-app.
\51\ Nazish Dholakia & Maya Wang, ``Interview: China's `Big
Brother' App--Unprecedented View into Mass Surveillance of Xinjiang's
Muslims,'' Human Rights Watch, May 1, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/
2019/05/01/interview-chinas-big-brother-app.
\52\ Nazish Dholakia & Maya Wang, ``Interview: China's `Big
Brother' App--Unprecedented View into Mass Surveillance of Xinjiang's
Muslims,'' Human Rights Watch, May 1, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/
2019/05/01/interview-chinas-big-brother-app; United Nations, UN
Declaration of Human Rights, United Nations, 3rd Session, (Dec. 10,
1948), https://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Documents/UDHR--Translations/
eng.pdf. Article 12 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights states that
``No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy,
family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and
reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against
such interference or attacks.'' Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The surveillance system in Xinjiang has aided in the
detention of possibly more than 2 million Uyghurs, ethnic
Kazakhs, and members of other Muslim groups in Xinjiang,
according to the U.S. State Department.\53\ Chinese officials
have labeled these detention facilities as ``vocational skills
training centers'' to ``deradicalize'' those suspected of
extremism.\54\ However, these centers are little more than
arbitrary prison camps designed for political indoctrination.
Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities imprisoned in internment
camps are subject to abuse, squalid and unsanitary living
conditions, lack of sleep and food, and forced political
indoctrination.\55\ In her account to CNN, Sayragul Sauytbay, a
former employee at one of the detention facilities in Xinjiang
who fled to Kazakhstan, recalls a CCP official telling her the
primary objective of the detention system was to ``turn the
best of them [Uyghurs and other minorities] into Hans, while
repressing and destroying the bad.''\56\ Sauytbay further
describes that she suspected numerous human rights abuses,
including sexual violence against female inmates and injections
for non-compliant individuals.\57\ Child separation due to
forced detentions or exile is also a regular occurrence.
Researcher Adrian Zenz highlights this separation process,
writing that ``[a]ccounts of Xinjiang Turkic Muslims in exile,
including former detainees and their relatives, indicated that
children as young as 2 years, with both parents in either
internment or exile, were put into state welfare institutions
or kept full-time in educational boarding facilities.''\58\
These accounts underline how China's surveillance state in
Xinjiang abets the CCP's overt attempts to forcefully
assimilate its ethnic minority populations into complying with
the authoritarian government model proffered by Beijing.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\53\ U.S. Department of State, ``2018 Report on International
Religious Freedom: China: Xinjiang,'' May 23, 2019. https://bit.ly/
2KroAuF (last visited July 10, 2020).
\54\ Eva Dou, ``China Acknowledges Re-Education Centers for
Uighurs,'' The Wall Street Journal, Oct. 10, 2018.
\55\ Matt Rivers & Lily Lee, ``Former Xinjiang Teacher Claims
Brainwashing and Abuse Inside Mass Detention Centers,'' CNN, May 9,
2019.
\56\ Id.
\57\ Id.
\58\ Adrian Zenz, ``Break Their Roots: Evidence for China's Parent-
Child Separation Campaign in Xinjiang,'' The Journal of Political Risk,
Vol. 7, No. 7 (July 2019), https://bit.ly/39eorVV.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While the authoritarian nature of the Chinese government's
operations--especially against Uyghurs--in Xinjiang is alarming
by itself, a second disturbing trend is the fact that China is
supporting the development and use of technologies that conduct
surveillance along racial and ethnic lines. Experts cited by
The New York Times described China's usage of facial
recognition to track Uyghurs as ``the first known example of a
government intentionally using artificial intelligence for
racial profiling.''\59\ China accomplishes racial
classification by instructing facial recognition AI to
categorize individuals based on social definitions of race or
ethnicity.\60\ While Beijing argues that sorting individuals
via race or ethnicity is necessary to combat terrorism or quell
``ethnic violence'' in Xinjiang, China's use of emerging
technologies and big data for racial profiling sets a
terrifying precedent for how to effectively repress vulnerable
populations and serves as a potential model for other
authoritarians around the globe.\61\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\59\ Paul Mozur, ``One Month, 500,000 Face Scans: How China is
Using A.I. to Profile a Minority,'' The New York Times, Apr. 14, 2019.
\60\ Id.
\61\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In Xinjiang, Chinese government and police authorities
retain what amounts to near absolute control of the entire ICT
domain, and, through that control, have been able to repress
and subjugate Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in the
region. It is important to note that, while all of China
experiences some form of surveillance due to the CCP's
authoritarian principles, the severity of controls in Xinjiang
are not yet fully present throughout the rest of China.
However, Xinjiang is the proving ground for China's digital
authoritarianism model, and it serves as a clear example of how
the CCP plans to use the digital domain to maintain and
strengthen its authoritarian hold over the entire country. This
plan may start to come into focus as early as 2020, as the
Chinese government begins to implement a unified Social Credit
System that captures all 1.4 billion citizens.\62\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\62\ Interview of Georgette Kerr, Vice President of Plurus
Strategies, Aug. 16, 2019; World Bank, ``China'' https://
data.worldbank.org/country/china (last visited Apr. 28, 2020).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's Social Credit System is an intrusive tool used by
all levels of the Chinese government to regulate corporate and
citizen behavior. Various entities at the local or city level,
such as police departments or health bureaus, gather swaths of
behavioral information and data on individuals.\63\ This data,
which can range from jaywalking to donating blood, is then
submitted to local databases.\64\ Relevant information
collected on individuals is also sent to the national level via
the National Credit Information Sharing Platform (NCISP), in
which the central government maintains a master database that
other state agencies can access.\65\ With this information on
hand and a whole-of-government approach, the Social Credit
System allows China to more robustly manage individual behavior
and punish those deemed problematic by placing them on
blacklists or no-fly lists.\66\ Although presented in a more
sanitized manner to entire Chinese populace, the Social Credit
System opens up greater opportunities for the Chinese
government to oppress all citizens in a manner similar to what
the people in Xinjiang face, and the rapidity with which the
government is moving forward in implementing these new
authoritarian models of surveillance shows how important the
issue is to the CCP.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\63\ Kendra Schaefer & Ether Yin, Understanding China's Social
Credit System, Trivium China, at 24 (Sept. 23, 2019), https://bit.ly/
334rADz.
\64\ Id.
\65\ Id.at 3, 24.
\66\ Id.
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The Censorship Apparatus: Exploiting and Blocking
Digital Content
China's burgeoning surveillance state offers CCP
authorities the ability to observe and maintain social control
over its citizens and represents a fundamental component of its
digital authoritarianism model. A second, equally identifiable
aspect of China's internal digital authoritarianism is the
CCP's efforts at controlling flows of data. The CCP has spent
decades building tools, mechanisms, and the infrastructure
needed to cultivate a system for direct control of the content
accessed by those in China. China's control over content has
stunted political movements and silenced public criticism
domestically by stifling access to a free Internet and
tailoring CCP propaganda so that it efficiently targets the
Chinese population.\67\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\67\ See, e.g., Michael Anti, ``Behind the Great Firewall of
China,'' TedGlobal2012 (video), TED, June 2012, https://bit.ly/332QNhY;
Kenneth Roth, ``China's Global Threat to Human Rights,'' Human Rights
Watch Global Report, 2020.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
One of the fundamental fears of China's leadership when
Internet access first arose in China in the 1990s was the
technology's potential to introduce uncontrolled sources of
information that could undermine CCP control by providing
Chinese citizens with greater access to uncensored information
and easier, more rapid communication.\68\ To combat the
possibility of the Internet operating as a democratizing force
in China, China's Ministry of Public Security initiated the
Golden Shield Project and debuted it in 2000.\69\ Also known as
the Great Firewall, it is central to the CCP's censorship
efforts and uses a set of Internet traffic screening tools to
filter out websites and content deemed inappropriate for
China's Internet.\70\ These tools span technical mechanisms,
such as DNS poisoning, blocking the use of virtual private
networks (VPN), and blocking IP addresses, to more human-based
oversight, including monitors employed by the Ministry of
Public Security.\71\ Since its inception, the Great Firewall in
China has developed into a complex censorship apparatus,
essentially creating an entirely separate version of the
Internet.\72\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\68\ See, e.g., Ping Punyakumpol, ``The Great Firewall of China:
Background,'' Torfox (A Stanford Project), Stanford University, June 1,
2011, https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/2010-11/
FreedomOfInformationChina/the-great-firewall-of-china-background/
index.html; Nina Hachigian, ``China's Cyber-Strategy,'' Foreign Affairs
(Mar./Apr. 2001).
\69\ Ping Punyakumpol, ``The Great Firewall of China: Background,''
Torfox (A Stanford Project), Stanford University, June 1, 2011.
\70\ Id.
\71\ Oliver Farnan et al., ``Poisoning the Well--Exploring the
Great Firewall's Poisoned DNS Responses,'' WPES '16: Proceedings of the
2016 ACM on Workshop on Privacy in the Electronic Society, Oct. 2016,
at 95, https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/2994620.2994636; Cate Cadell,
``Amid VPN crackdown, China eyes upgrades to Great Firewall,'' Reuters,
July 20, 2017; Robert McMahon & Isabella Bennett, ``U.S. Internet
Providers and the `Great Firewall of China,''' Council on Foreign
Relations, Feb. 23, 2011; Marty Hu, ``The Great Firewall: a technical
perspective,'' Torfox (A Stanford Project), Stanford University, May
30, 2011, https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/2010-
11/FreedomOfInformationChina/author/martyhu/index.html.
\72\ See, e.g., ``China Media Bulletin: 2019 internet freedom
trends, Shutterstock censorship, Huawei ``safe cities'' (No. 140),''
Freedom House, https://freedomhouse.org/report/china-media-bulletin/
2020/china-media-bulletin-2019-internet-freedom-trends-shutterstock
(last visited July 10, 2020).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
More recently, Chinese companies have begun implementing
emerging technologies, such as AI, to strengthen these
censorship capabilities further through the automation of its
monitoring and censorship processes.\73\ China has also
developed a culture of self-censorship.\74\ The Chinese
government requires Chinese firms to self-regulate content on
their servers and platforms. For example, the New York Times
noted in 2010 that major technology companies such as Baidu
``employ throngs of so-called Web administrators to screen
their search engines, chat rooms, blogs and other content for
material that flouts propaganda directives.''\75\ A Chinese
state media report said in 2013 that the government then
employed approximately two million civilians who monitor social
media and other Internet traffic to prevent social unrest and
criticism of the government.\76\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\73\ Yuan Yang, ``Artificial intelligence takes jobs from Chinese
web censors,'' Financial Times, May 22, 2018.
\74\ Ping Punyakumpol, ``The Great Firewall of China: Background,''
Torfox (A Stanford Project), Stanford University, June 1, 2011, https:/
/cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/2010-11/
FreedomOfInformationChina/the-great-firewall-of-china-background/
index.html
\75\ Michael Wines et al., ``China's Censors Tackle and Trip Over
the Internet,'' The New York Times, Apr. 7, 2010.
\76\ Katie Hunt & CY Xu, ``China `employs 2 million to police
internet,''' CNN, Oct. 7, 2013; Google Translate: ``Internet public
opinion analyst: It's note about deleting posts,'' Beijing News, Oct.
3, 2013, http://epaper.bjnews.com.cn/html/2013-10/03/content--
469152.htm?div=-1.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The consequences of China's government enforcing tight
censorship include (1) a population that is unaware of, or
unable to acquire, accurate information about its government's
policies and actions; and (2) continued consolidation of CCP
rule. The Great Firewall has blocked digital news media content
created by major international outlets not approved by the
CCP.\77\ According to Freedom House's analysis of Chinese
censorship directives, China heavily censors news ranging from
health and safety to ``taboo subjects'' such as the Cultural
Revolution and Tiananmen Square.\78\ Freedom House states that
censorship against international news outlets is so prevalent
that:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\77\ Gerry Shih, ``China adds Washington Post, Guardian to `Great
Firewall' blacklist,'' The Washington Post, June 8, 2019.
\78\ ``Freedom on the Net 2019: China,'' Freedom House, https://
freedomhouse.org/country/china/freedom-net/2019 (last visited May 15,
2020); Sarah Cook, ``The News China Didn't Want Reported in 2017,'' The
Diplomat, Jan. 27, 2018.
Many international news outlets, especially those with
Chinese-language websites, are blocked. For example,
the New York Times, Reuters, and the Wall Street
Journal have been censored for years, while the
websites of the Washington Post and the Guardian were
newly blocked in June 2019, likely as part of the
government's efforts to tighten its grip on the flow of
information surrounding the 30th anniversary of the
Tiananmen Square crackdown.\79\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\79\ ``Freedom on the Net 2019: China,'' Freedom House, https://
freedomhouse.org/country/china/freedom-net/2019 (last visited May 15,
2020); Gerry Shih, ``China adds Washington Post, Guardian to `Great
Firewall' blacklist,'' The Washington Post, June 8, 2019.
This censorship has aided the CCP's efforts to ensure that
those living in China only receive information approved by the
Party, a fundamental aspect of maintaining its status in
China's public domain.
U.S. social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram,
Twitter, WhatsApp, Pinterest, and YouTube have also been
blocked entirely from China's servers.\80\ While censorship of
these platforms has had the intended effect of barring many of
those living in China from accessing information that would be
deemed offensive to the Party, this censorship has also
generated a second critical outcome. Foreign technology
platforms are restricted from operating in China, allowing
Chinese platforms that offer similar services to thrive and
expand into new markets.\81\ Thanks to this market
inefficiency, China now retains some of the most valuable
Internet companies in the world by market capitalization,
including Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu.\82\ These companies
essentially provide the panoply of Internet services wanted in
China. Alibaba offers e-commerce services, and Tencent delivers
social media, entertainment, and gaming, negating the need for
other platforms where information flows freely.\83\ The
consequences of this are a Chinese population that is reliant
on platforms that further cement the CCP's control of the
digital domain.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\80\ ``Freedom on the Net 2019: China,'' Freedom House, https://
freedomhouse.org/country/china/freedom-net/2019 (last accessed May 15,
2020); Sherisse Pham, ``China adds Pinterest to list of banned sites,''
CNN, Mar. 17, 2017; GreatFire.Org, ``Censorship of Alexa Top 1000
Domains in China,'' https://en.greatfire.org/search/alexa-top-1000-
domains (last visited June 26, 2020).
\81\ See, e.g., Tim Wu, ``China's Online Censorship Stifles Trade,
Too,'' The New York Times, Feb. 4, 2019.
\82\ J. Clement, ``Market value of the largest internet companies
worldwide 2019,'' Statista, June 3, 2020, https://www.statista.com/
statistics/277483/market-value-of-the-largest-internet-companies-
worldwide/; Tim Wu, ``China's Online Censorship Stifles Trade, Too,''
The New York Times, Feb. 4, 2019; Simon Denyer, ``China's Scary Lesson
to the World: Censoring the Internet Works,'' The Washington Post, May
23, 2016.
\83\ Australian Strategic Policy Institute, ``Tencent,'' https://
chinatechmap.aspi.org.au/#/company/tencent (last visited June 5, 2020);
Australian Strategic Policy Institute, ``Alibaba,'' https://
chinatechmap.aspi.org.au/#/company/alibaba (last visited June 5, 2020).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's censorship extends beyond simply separating China's
Internet from outside information. China's censors are using
offensive tools and aggressive tactics that reach far beyond
scrubbing and blocking data to ensure robust censorship.
Citizen Lab, an interdisciplinary laboratory based at the
University of Toronto, asserts that the Chinese government used
an attack tool, which they label the ``Great Cannon,'' to
extend the reach of China's censorship.\84\ The Great Cannon,
while co-located within the Great Firewall, is a ``separate
offensive system'' that ``hijacks traffic to (or presumably
from) individual IP addresses, and can arbitrarily replace
unencrypted content as a man-in-the-middle.''\85\ China used
the Great Cannon to conduct Distributed Denial of Service
(DDoS) attacks on servers rented by GreatFire.org, an advocacy
nonprofit that challenges China's Great Firewall, and GitHub
pages run by GreatFire.org in 2015.\86\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\84\ Bill Marczak et al., China's Great Cannon, The Citizen Lab,
Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto
(Apr. 10, 2015), https://citizenlab.ca/2015/04/chinas-great-cannon/.
\85\ Id.
\86\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's use of an offensive cyber tool for censorship
purposes is revelatory because it shows China taking action
beyond its borders to ensure censorship within its borders.
China is also cracking down on tools that ordinary Chinese
citizens use to overcome the Great Firewall, such as virtual
private networks.\87\ In January 2019, the Financial Times
showed how China is cracking down on individual use of VPN
tools. The Financial Times highlighted how a Chinese man, Zhu
Yunfeng, received a significant fine for accessing foreign
websites and using the VPN Lantern, as well as how another
individual, Pan Xidian, received a jail sentence for VPN use
and composing ``inappropriate'' Twitter posts.\88\ Providers of
these tools are receiving even stiffer sentences, such as Wu
Xiangyang, who in 2017 received a five and a half year jail
sentence and 500,000 yuan fine (approximately $70,650) for
selling software that circumvented China's Internet censorship
controls.\89\ The result of these efforts is a censorship
system that can rely on a variety of continually evolving tools
to ensure that online and social media users can be targeted if
they post comments that the government and Party deem
politically sensitive. Everyday citizens consequently retain
fewer avenues to acquire non-CCP approved information.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\87\ Cisco, ``What Is a VPN? - Virtual Private Network,'' https://
www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/vpn-endpoint-security-clients/
what-is-vpn.html (last visited June 7, 2019). A virtual private
network, or VPN, is an encrypted connection over the Internet from a
device to a network. The encrypted connection helps ensure that
sensitive data is safely transmitted. It prevents unauthorized people
from eavesdropping on the traffic and allows the user to conduct work
remotely. Id.
\88\ Yuan Yang, ``China Turns Up Heat on Individual Users of
Foreign Websites,'' Financial Times, Jan. 7, 2019.
\89\ Benjamin Haas, ``Man in China Sentenced to Five Years' Jail
for Running VPN,'' The Guardian, Dec. 21, 2017.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Legal System: China's Implementation
of Authoritarian Cyber Laws
In a position paper titled ``China's Digital Rise--
Challenges for Europe,'' authors Kristin Shi-Kupfer and Mareike
Ohlberg of the Mercator Institute for China Studies note that,
when developing new technologies, an unofficial Chinese
government slogan is ``first develop, then regulate.''\90\ This
unofficial slogan demonstrates that the government has
prioritized the maturation of its emerging digital technologies
and then, as they are integrated into society, regulates their
use as needed. With China's continued rise in this domain, the
Chinese government now is increasingly implementing stringent
rules and regulations to ensure that the cyber domain remains
compliant with Party strictures. The regulations China has
implemented recently expand government control over cyberspace
at the legal level, making its myriad authoritarian actions to
quell dissent and promote Chinese propaganda seem lawful.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\90\ Kristin Shi-Kupfer & Mareike Ohlberg, China's Digital Rise:
Challenges for Europe, Mercator Institute for China Studies, Vol. 7, at
9 (Apr. 2019), https://www.merics.org/sites/default/files/2019-04/
MPOC--No.7--ChinasDigitalRise--web--3.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In November 2016, the 24th Session of the Standing
Committee of the 12th National People's Congress passed the
Cybersecurity Law of the People's Republic of China,
fundamentally altering the cyber landscape in China.\91\ Coming
into effect on June 1, 2017, and enforced by the Cyberspace
Administration of China (CAC) and other related ministries, the
law affords government entities broad authority to regulate and
control the digital environment in China.\92\ In addition to
the Cybersecurity Law, the Chinese government is layering
various regulations on top of it to give the law both more
clarity and teeth.\93\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\91\ IT Advisory KPMG China, ``Overview of China's Cybersecurity
Law,'' KPMG, Feb.
2017, at 4, https://assets.kpmg/content/dam/kpmg/cn/pdf/en/2017/02/
overview-of-cybersecurity-law.pdf; Samuel Stolton, ``Chinese
cybersecurity law is a `loaded weapon,' senior US official says,''
Euractiv, Feb. 27, 2019, https://www.euractiv.com/section/
cybersecurity/news/chinese-cybersecurity-law-is-a-loaded-weapon-senior-
us-official-says/.
\92\ Interview of Georgette Kerr, Vice President of Plurus
Strategies, Aug. 16, 2019; Samm Sacks, ``China's Cybersecurity Law
Takes Effect: What to Expect,'' Lawfare, June 1, 2017, https://
www.lawfareblog.com/chinas-cybersecurity-law-takes-effect-what-expect.
\93\ Samm Sacks, ``China's Cybersecurity Law Takes Effect: What to
Expect,'' Lawfare,
June 1, 2017, https://www.lawfareblog.com/chinas-cybersecurity-law-
takes-effect-what-expect; Samm Sacks et al., ``China's Cybersecurity
Reviews for 'Critical' Systems Add Focus on Supply Chain, Foreign
Control (Translation),'' New America, May 24, 2019, https://bit.ly/
2HkSaAT.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While the Cybersecurity Law and relevant additional
regulations put forth a variety of new stipulations on
individuals and companies, there are a few provisions of the
law and related regulations that are especially emblematic of
China's effort at increasing social and political control of
the digital domain. One of these is the repeated vague
references in the Cybersecurity Law to national security needs,
opening individuals and organizations to intrusive and
potentially abusive reviews of cyber activity.\94\ According to
Georgette Kerr, a cyber-expert at Plurus Strategies, ``the law
and associated directives have compelled network operators to
cooperate with law enforcement in addressing vaguely defined
threats to national security [and] established intrusive
national security reviews,'' seen in clauses such as Article
28.\95\ Article 28 states that ``network operators shall
provide technical support and assistance to public security
organs and national security organs that are safeguarding
national security and investigating criminal activities in
accordance with the law.''\96\ The law in effect uses national
security as a legal mechanism to assert its authoritarian
control over data flows in China in new ways. The law
additionally affords the government even more dystopian powers
in special circumstances dictated by the State Council. Under
Article 58 of the law, authorities can ``take temporary
measures regarding network communications in a specially
designated region, such as limiting such communications,''
further underscoring how the 2017 law fully empowers the
Chinese government to control the digital domain anytime the
government claims such control is necessary.\97\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\94\ Interview of Georgette Kerr, Vice President of Plurus
Strategies, Aug. 16, 2019.
\95\ Id.
\96\ Rogier Creemers et al., ``Translation: Cybersecurity Law of
the People's Republic of China [Effective June 1, 2017],'' New America,
June 29, 2019, https://bit.ly/3nFqKVO.
\97\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The implementation of the Cybersecurity Law also imposes
serious controls and restrictions on foreign companies
operating in China. Jack Wagner, an Asia analyst at PGI
Intelligence writing in The Diplomat, notes that ``several of
the provisions . . . have become a cause for concern among
foreign companies.''\98\ For example, Wagner highlights data
localization rules in the law, under which foreign companies
would need to store data on Chinese servers.\99\ Due to data
localization laws, firms would either need to ``invest in new
data servers in China which would be subject to government
spot-checks, or incur new costs to hire a local server
provider, such as Huawei, Tencent, or Alibaba, which have spent
billions in recent years establishing domestic data centers as
part of Beijing's 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015).''\100\
Neither of these options are positive for companies looking to
operate in China, as they open up sensitive information to
intrusive snooping by Chinese authorities.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\98\ Jack Wagner, ``China's Cybersecurity Law: What You Need to
Know,'' The Diplomat, June 1, 2017.
\99\ Id.
\100\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another key issue stemming from China's burgeoning legal
structures pertaining to the digital domain is the continued
erosion of online anonymity. Samm Sacks and Paul Triolo,
writing in Lawfare, describe how the CAC added four regulations
in August and September of 2017 regarding online activity that
effectively reduce online anonymity. These four regulations are
1) the Internet Forum Service Management Regulation, 2) the
Internet Threat Comments Service Management Regulation, 3) the
Internet User Public Account Information Services Management
Regulation, and 4) the Management Rules of Internet Group
Information Services.\101\ The regulations disallow online
anonymity by requiring ``foreground voluntary name, background
real name.'' This requirement means that users can choose a
screen name or appear anonymous, but their actual identity
information will still be stored with the Ministry of Public
Security.\102\ Sacks and Triolo note that, by reducing
anonymity online, Chinese authorities receive more real data to
add to their burgeoning databases on citizen behavior such as
the Social Credit System, and by extension, further their
oversight of the population.\103\ Similarly, in November 2018,
the government implemented new regulations granting ``the
Ministry of Public Security (MPS) broad powers over the
computer networks of companies in China.''\104\ The rule,
labeled ``Regulations on Internet Security Supervision and
Inspection by Public Security Organs,'' provides MPS with new
opportunities to conduct on site and remote site inspections of
company computers, copy user information, have police backup
during inspections to ensure company compliance, and monitor
company adherence to censorship laws.\105\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\101\ Samm Sacks & Paul Triolo, ``Shrinking Anonymity in Chinese
Cyberspace,'' Lawfare, Sept. 25, 2017, https://www.lawfareblog.com/
shrinking-anonymity-chinese-cyberspace.
\102\ Id.
\103\ Id.
\104\ Insikt Group, ``China's New Cybersecurity Measures Allow
State Police to Remotely Access Company Systems,'' Recorded Future,
Feb. 8, 2019, https://www.recordedfuture.com/china-cybersecurity-
measures/.
\105\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Although the Chinese government may be reacting to some
valid cybersecurity concerns in building and growing the legal
frameworks surrounding cyber activity, it is no accident that
this framework simultaneously provides legitimacy to China's
authoritarian actions in the digital domain. As seen above, the
various laws and regulations implemented by the Chinese
government provide censors, law enforcement, intelligence
agencies, and other entities with legal cover to impinge on
privacy rights and conduct undue searches and seizures of
information contained or passed in cyberspace. The
ramifications of the promulgation of China's digital laws
include the establishment of an Internet governance framework
that ensures, at the most fundamental level, CCP regime
survival and operates as a direct contrast to the systems and
laws promulgated by the U.S. and its allies.
China's Investment in Technologies Predicated
on Authoritarian Principles
China's growing promotion of digital authoritarianism has
coincided with its rise as a technological leader. These
technologies, as demonstrated above, make surveillance and
censorship both easier and stronger than ever before for CCP
authorities. As such, the rise of digital authoritarianism in
China is facilitated by the continued development of new
technologies consistent with authoritarian principles.
Consequently, the CCP continues to emphasize investment and
innovation in new technologies, which will further strengthen
its ability to exercise authoritarian rule in China.\106\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\106\ See, e.g., Sophia Yan, ``Chinese surveillance grows stronger
with technology that can recognise people from how they walk,''
Telegraph, Nov. 6, 2018; Statement of William Carter, Deputy Director
and Fellow, Technology Policy Program, Chinese Advances in Emerging
Technologies and their Implications for U.S. National Security, Hearing
before the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, Jan.
9, 2018, at 2, 6.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's focus on investing in cyber and digital
technologies comes from the highest echelons of CCP leadership,
who have advocated new technologies as critical to China's rise
as a global power. The Made in China 2025 initiative was a
state-led industrial policy intended ``to make China dominant
in global high-tech manufacturing'' by using ``government
subsidies, mobiliz[ing] state-owned enterprises, and pursu[ing]
intellectual property acquisition to catch up with--and then
surpass--Western technological prowess in advanced
industries.''\107\ The policy prioritizes ten major sectors, of
which one is new information technology.\108\ Made in China
2025 operated as a ten-year plan driving China's industrial
development, and its prioritization of the technologies within
the digital domain accentuates the CCP's desire to strengthen
Chinese-made ICT products and services. Additionally, China's
Internet Plus policy, also unveiled in 2015, ``aims to
capitalize on China's huge online consumer market by building
up the country's domestic mobile Internet, cloud computing,
massive amounts of data (big data), and the Internet of Things
sectors.''\109\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\107\ James McBride & Andrew Chatzky, ``Is `Made in China 2025' a
Threat to Global Trade?'' Council on Foreign Relations, May 13, 2019.
See also Emily Crawford, ``Made in China 2025: The Industrial Plan that
China Doesn't Want Anyone Talking About,'' PBS, May 7, 2019.
\108\ Press Release, State Council of the People's Republic of
China, ``Made in China 2025,'' May 19, 2015, https://bit.ly/2Wa6hNf.
\109\ Meia Nouwens & Helena Legarda, Emerging technology dominance:
what China's pursuit of advanced dual-use technologies means for the
future of Europe's economy and defence innovation, China Security
Project at MERICS and The International Institute for Strategic
Studies, at 5 (Dec. 2018); Press Release, State Council of the People's
Republic of China, ``China unveils Internet Plus action plan to fuel
growth,'' July 4, 2015, http://english.www.gov.cn/policies/latest--
releases/2015/07/04/content--281475140165588.htm.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
CCP leaders have also delivered statements further backing
China's emphasis on developing its cyber capabilities. General
Secretary Xi, in an October 9, 2016 Politburo meeting on cyber
and IT issues, asserted that China ``must accelerate the
advancement of domestic production, indigenous and controllable
substitution plans, and the building of secure and controllable
information technology systems.''\110\ Wang Huning, a member of
the Standing Committee of the Politburo, relayed Xi's stance on
information technology development in December 2017, saying
``[CCP] General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized the need to . .
. deepen Internet and information technology, build a cyber
superpower, and advance society through a digital China; and to
advance Internet, big data, artificial intelligence, and data
economy, etc.''\111\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\110\ Michael Martina, ``Xi Says China Must Speed Up Plans for
Domestic Network Technology,'' Reuters, Oct. 9, 2016. See also ``The
Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
China Conducted the 36th Collective Study on the Implementation of the
Cyber Power Strategy,'' Xinhua News Agency, Oct. 9, 2016, http://
www.gov.cn/xinwen/2016-10/09/content--5116444.htm (translated from
Chinese).
\111\ Graham Webster et al., ``Wang Huning's Speech at the 4th
World Internet Conference in Wuzhen,'' New America, Dec. 13, 2017,
https://www.newamerica.org/cybersecurity-initiative/digichina/blog/
wang-hunings-speech-4th-world-internet-conference-wuzhen/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In addition to highlighting China's desire to strengthen
information technologies, CCP leaders' statements often denote
the need for sanitizing cyberspace from what the Party believes
to be toxic content. Chen Yixin, the Secretary-General of the
CCP's Legal Affairs Commission, highlighted this priority in
January 2019, stating that a ``small incident can form into a
vortex of public opinion'' on the Internet.\112\ Zhuang
Rongwen, Vice Minister of the Central Propaganda Department,
and Director of the Central Cybersecurity and Informatization
Office and State Internet Information Office, provided
additional context to China's desire to control the digital
domain in September 2018 with the assertion that:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\112\ Chris Buckley, ``2019 Is a Sensitive Year for China. Xi is
Nervous,'' The New York Times, Feb. 25, 2019.
The Internet has become a main battlefield, main
battleground, and most forward position in propaganda
and public opinion work. To grasp leadership authority
in online ideological work, we must not only give full
rein to the main force role of Party members, cadres,
and mainstream media editors, pushing the main forces
onto the main battlefield; we must also give full rein
to the dominant role of the majority of Internet users,
and fight a people's war for the governance of the
online environment.\113\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\113\ Rogier Creemers et al., ``Translation: China's New Top
Internet Official Lays Out Agenda for Party Control Online,'' New
America, Sept. 24, 2018, https://www.newamerica.org/cybersecurity-
initiative/digichina/blog/translation-chinas-new-top-internet-official-
lays-out-agenda-for-party-control-online/.
To CCP leadership, the digital domain is a space that must
be controlled by the Party. As such, development of new
digitally enabled technologies must operate in line with Party
principles. Without such control, CCP leaders fear these
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
technologies could weaken the CCP's hold over its citizens.
The CCP has implemented industrial policies with massive
investments in technology and lucrative conditions for Chinese
firms operating in digital fields. China's research and
development spending grew by more than 17% each year from 2010
to 2017 and in 2018 hit a record high of 2.19 percent of
GDP.\114\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\114\ ``China's spending on R&D rises to historic high,'' Xinhua
News, Sept. 7, 2019, http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-09/07/c--
138373248.htm; Niall McCarthy, ``China Is Closing The Gap With The U.S.
In R&D Expenditure,'' Forbes, Jan. 20, 2020; Zhang Jun, ``Will China Be
the Next Tech Powerhouse? Maybe with the Next 20 Years of Sustained
Investment,'' South China Morning Post, Aug. 1, 2018, https://
www.scmp.com/comment/insight-opinion/united-states/article/2157728/
will-china-be-next-tech-powerhouse-maybe-next.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
These investments have only continued to accelerate. China
has spent incredible amounts of resources bolstering startups
working in the surveillance field. The New York Times reported
that, in May 2018, ``the upstart A.I. company SenseTime raised
$620 million, giving it a valuation of about $4.5 billion. Yitu
raised $200 million [in June 2018]. Another rival, Megvii,
raised $460 million from investors that included a state-backed
fund created by China's top leadership.''\115\ The European
Union Chamber of Commerce in China, in its ``China
Manufacturing 2025'' report, tells a similar story of how China
is boosting its domestic telecommunications industry. The
report notes that:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\115\ Paul Mozur, ``Inside China's Dystopian Dreams: A.I., Shame
and Lots of Cameras,'' The New York Times, July 8, 2018.
The Chinese Government has used a variety of policy
instruments to support the development of its domestic
telecommunications equipment industry. One of the most
prominent has been the use of catalogues of domestic
high-technology products, as well as an equivalent list
for exports. Firms whose products are included in these
catalogues receive benefits, such as preferential tax
rates and low-interest loans from state-owned
banks.\116\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\116\ China Manufacturing 2025, European Union Chamber of Commerce
in China, at 26 (2017), http://docs.dpaq.de/12007-european--chamber--
cm2025-en.pdf.
China's firms have found that operating in zones that
promulgate digital authoritarianism in China is an extremely
profitable business. In Xinjiang, Hikvision received
approximately $290 million for security related contracts,
including a ``social prevention and control system'' and a
program implementing facial-recognition surveillance in and
around mosques.\117\ Combined with Dahua's own contracts in
Xinjiang, Hikvision and Dahua have won ``at least $1.2 billion
in government contracts for 11 separate, large-scale
surveillance projects across Xinjiang.''\118\ The fact that
Chinese firms are receiving such strong returns for working in
fields that fundamentally promote authoritarian rule in China
highlight Chinese leadership's willingness to invest in
technologies that enable greater social and digital control.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\117\ Ben Dooley, ``Chinese Firms Cash in on Xinjiang's Growing
Police State,'' Agence France-Presse, June 27, 2018. See also Chris
Buckley & Paul Mozur, ``How China Uses High-Tech Surveillance to Subdue
Minorities,'' The New York Times, May 22, 2019.
\118\ Charles Rollet, ``In China's Far West, Companies Cash in on
Surveillance Program that Targets Muslims,'' Foreign Policy, June 13,
2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's leadership firmly believes that the country is on a
path towards becoming a global power capable of exerting
influence practically anywhere, and that a core aspect of
achieving this goal is dominance in the digital domain. For
China's government, this dominance starts at home, and its
current policies and investments underscore the CCP's focus on
strengthening the domestic base for information technologies.
Chapter 2: Exporting Digital Authoritarianism--China on the Global
Cyber Stage
----------
China's leadership is increasingly confident that its
governing model for the digital space represents the future of
the domain and is doing its best to convince governments around
the world that this is the case. Digital authoritarianism in
China is enabling the CCP to impose considerable control over
its population and the information accessible to those in the
country, providing the regime with increased security from
democratizing forces and further opportunities for economic and
technological growth. As China continues to perfect the tools
that comprise its model of digital authoritarianism, its
leaders have become more aware of the geopolitical and economic
benefits of exporting both the technologies and the methods of
digital authoritarianism to perpetuate its model of extensive
censorship and automated surveillance.\119\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\119\ Adrian Shahbaz, Freedom of the Net 2018: The Rise of Digital
Authoritarianism, Freedom House (Oct. 31, 2018), https://bit.ly/
2IYJkJE.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chinese leaders are using information and communications
technology (ICT) and digital media to increase their power
abroad as well as at home, including by building on the Belt
and Road Initiative's (BRI) infrastructure, trade, training,
and investment links between China and more than 60 other
countries.\120\ At the first BRI forum in May 2017, Chinese
President Xi Jinping announced that China would integrate big
data into the multi-billion dollar BRI enterprise to create the
``digital silk road of the 21st century.''\121\ China has also
begun to install fiber optic networks across the globe, setting
the stage to assert its presence in the ICT sector and
facilitate the export of digital authoritarianism.\122\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\120\ Andrew Chatzky & James McBride, ``China's Massive Belt and
Road Initiative,'' Council on Foreign Relations, last updated Jan. 28,
2020, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-massive-belt-and-road-
initiative; Adrian Shahbaz, Freedom of the Net 2018: The Rise of
Digital Authoritarianism, Freedom House (Oct. 31, 2018), https://
freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/2018/rise-digital-authoritarianism.
\121\ Xi Jinping, CCP General Secretary, Remarks at ``Work Together
to Build the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk
Road,'' Beijing, May 14, 2017; Andrew Chatzky & James McBride,
``China's Massive Belt and Road Initiative,'' Council on Foreign
Relations, last updated Jan. 28, 2020, https://www.cfr.org/
backgrounder/chinas-massive-belt-and-road-initiative.
\122\ Adrian Shahbaz, Freedom of the Net 2018: The Rise of Digital
Authoritarianism, Freedom House (Oct. 31, 2018), https://bit.ly/
2IYJkJE; Susan Crawford, ``China Will Likely Corner the 5G Market--and
the US Has No Plan,'' Wired, Feb. 20, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
When examining China's digital efforts abroad, a subtle yet
important distinction between China's fundamentally economic
activities and its more subversive and damaging endeavors that
aid in the expansion of digital authoritarianism must be made.
While China's attempts to gain a larger market in the digital
domain and to outcompete the United States in certain
technological spaces represent a significant concern for U.S.
economic interests, those efforts within a free international
market do not necessarily represent a national security
concern. What does raise critical national security concerns is
when China's digital efforts erode democratic values and enable
the rise of digital authoritarianism around the world. At best,
China is selling digital technology that has remarkable
capacity for surveillance and control to authoritarian or
authoritarian-leaning countries with no second thought for the
consequences. At worst, China is pairing its economic
investment with aggressive outreach and training on Internet
governance and domestic regulations to further inculcate
authoritarian values and methods of social control.
Exporting Technologies and Expanding Digital
Authoritarianism
The Digital Silk Road announcement only formalized efforts
already underway by China to expand into foreign markets. For
example, in 2015, China's third-largest telecom company, China
Telecom Group (CTG), announced the creation of its Africa and
Middle East headquarters, having already expanded its network
capabilities in the UAE, South Africa, Kenya, Egypt, and
Nigeria.\123\ It planned to continue growing its network
through deals with local companies such as the Wananchi Group,
East Africa's leading telecommunications operator.\124\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\123\ Rudradeep Biswas, ``Global: China Telecom Global Expands
Footprint in Africa and Middle East,'' Telecom Talk, June 9, 2015,
https://telecomtalk.info/global-china-telecom-global-expands-in-africa-
and-middle-east/137520/.
\124\ Id.; ``CTG Signs Deal with Wananchi Group for Major Fiber
Infrastructure Construction Project,'' China Telecom Group, Mar. 18,
2015, https://www.chinatelecomglobal.com/data/file/2016/
20160509171658535.pdf.
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The CTG announcement marks just one of the steps China and
Chinese businesses have taken to extend into the developing
world, efforts met with increasing success. Not only has China
been willing to go into smaller, under-served markets, Chinese
companies have been able to offer more cost-effective equipment
than Western companies, as well as financial support that comes
directly from the Chinese government.\125\ According to Mark
Natkin, founder and managing director of the Beijing-based
consultancy Marbridge, Chinese telecom vendors ``identified
opportunities in developing nations'' where they could
``leverage their price advantage to develop relationships that
vendors from rich countries [couldn't] be bothered with.''\126\
He goes on to describe China's approach as a long-term strategy
based on building the core network and banking on the
likelihood that doing so gives its companies a foothold to win
follow-on contracts for upgrades and expansions.\127\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\125\ Executive Research Associates, China in Africa: A Strategic
Overview, at 51 (Oct. 2009), https://www.ide.go.jp/library/English/
Data/Africa--file/Manualreport/pdf/china--all.pdf
\126\ Marbridge Consulting, ``Management,'' https://
www.marbridgeconsulting.com/management.html (last visited June 1,
2020); Executive Research Associates, China in Africa: A Strategic
Overview, at 50 (Oct. 2009).
\127\ Executive Research Associates, China in Africa: A Strategic
Overview, at 50 (Oct. 2009).
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Huawei, the subject of many headlines during the past few
years, is a prime example. In 1996, the Chinese government gave
Huawei the status of ``national champion'' and ensured it would
have easy access to financing and high levels of government
subsidies--$222 million in government grants in 2018.\128\
Government support has enabled Huawei to offer prices for its
network equipment that are below other companies' prices,
allowing Huawei to quickly gain market advantage. In the
Netherlands, for example, Huawei undercut its competitor, the
Swedish firm Ericsson, by underbidding for a contract to
provide network equipment for the Dutch national 5G network by
60 percent.\129\ Two industry officials who spoke to The
Washington Post on the condition of anonymity held that
Huawei's price was so low that, absent the subsidies the
company had been provided, Huawei would have been unable to
even produce the necessary network parts.\130\ Some countries
also receive low-interest loans from Chinese state-owned banks
to use Huawei equipment.\131\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\128\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019; Ellen Nakashima, ``U.S. pushes hard for a ban on Huawei in
Europe, but the firm's 5G prices are nearly irresistible,'' The
Washington Post, May 29, 2019; Jeffrey Melnik, ``China's `National
Champions' Alibaba, Tencent, and Huawei,'' Education About Asia, Vol.
24, Fall 2019, https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/chinas-
national-champions-alibaba-tencent-and-huawei.pdf.
\129\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019; Ellen Nakashima, ``U.S. pushes hard for a ban on Huawei in
Europe, but the firm's 5G prices are nearly irresistible,'' The
Washington Post, May 29, 2019.
\130\ Ellen Nakashima, ``U.S. pushes hard for a ban on Huawei in
Europe, but the firm's 5G prices are nearly irresistible,'' The
Washington Post, May 29, 2019.
\131\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019.
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The result has been near-complete dominance in some
regions. For example, in Africa Huawei has built about 70
percent of the 4G networks, and in cases such as Zambia, it is
developing the country's entire telecommunications
infrastructure.\132\ More broadly, Chinese technology now
serves as the ``backbone of network infrastructure'' in several
African countries, and Chinese firms like Huawei, ZTE, and
China Telecom are the major players in erecting the
infrastructure needed for next generation technologies across
the African continent.\133\ In Kenya alone, Huawei has built
more than 3,500 mobile base stations (the antennas that receive
and transmit radio frequencies which make mobile communications
possible) and installed 4,000 kilometers of fiber optic
cable.\134\
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\132\ Amy Mackinnon, ``For Africa, Chinese-Built Internet Is Better
Than No Internet at All,'' Foreign Policy, Mar. 19, 2019; Wesley Rahn,
``Will China's 5G `Digital Silk Road' Lead to an Authoritarian Future
for the Internet?,'' DW, Apr. 26, 2019.
\133\ Chiponda Chimbelu, ``Investing in Africa's tech
infrastructure. Has China won already?,'' DW, May 3, 2019.
\134\ Huawei, Huawei Kenya Sustainability Report 2018, (2018), at
8, https://www.huawei.com/minisite/explore-kenya/pdf/huawei--kenya--
csd--report--v2.pdf; ``Huawei Kenya launches first Sustainability
Report Highlighting Efforts to Expand Broadband Nationwide and
Solutions to Drive Kenya's Digital Transformation,'' Huawei, Sept. 7,
2019, https://www.huawei.com/ke/press-events/news/ke/2019/huawei-kenya-
launches-first-sustainability-report; Ericsson, ``Base stations and
networks,'' https://www.ericsson.com/en/about-us/sustainability-and-
corporate-responsibility/responsible-business/radio-waves-and-health/
base-stations-and-networks (last visited June 30, 2020). As a note,
there are different numbers provided regarding the number of mobile
base stations built by Huawei from these two citations. The 2018 report
states that the number of stations built is 3,500, while the press
release gives the number 3,5000. This report assumes that the number
3,5000 is a typographical error and uses the number of 3,500.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Today, Huawei operates in more than 170 countries and is
the second-largest smartphone seller in the world, just behind
Samsung, but ahead of Apple.\135\ Robert Atkinson, President of
the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a
U.S. think tank, states that Huawei's research and development
investments surpass any other company worldwide.\136\ Beyond
consumer electronics, Huawei offers telecommunications
equipment and cloud services.\137\ Furthermore, Huawei owns
more patents for 5G infrastructure than any of its
competitors.\138\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\135\ Huawei, ``About Huawei,'' https://www.huawei.com/us/about-
huawei (last visited June 1, 2020); Jusy Hong, ``Global smartphone
shipments fall for seventh consecutive quarter in Q2, even with limited
impact from US Huawei ban,'' Informa, Aug. 5, 2019, https://
technology.informa.com/616273/global-smartphone-shipments-fall-for-
seventh-consecutive-quarter-in-q2-even-with-limited-impact-from-us-
huawei-ban; Counterpoint, ``Global Smartphone Market Share: By
Quarter,'' https://www.counterpointresearch.com/global-smartphone-
share/ (last visited June 30, 2020).
\136\ Wesley Rahn, ``Will China's 5G `Digital Silk Road' Lead to an
Authoritarian Future for the Internet?,'' DW, Apr. 26, 2019;
Information Technology & Innovation Foundation, ``Robert D. Atkinson,''
https://itif.org/person/robert-d-atkinson (last visited June 1, 2020).
\137\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019; Huawei, ``About Huawei Cloud,'' https://www.huaweicloud.com/en-
us/about/about--us.html (last visited June 30, 2020).
\138\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019; Who is leading the 5G patent race, IPlytics, at 4 and 5 (Nov.
2019), https://www.iplytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Who-Leads-
the-5G-Patent-Race--2019.pdf.
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Huawei's investments in research and development have
positioned it to build the next-generation 5G infrastructure in
Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Alarmingly, even governments
close to the United States are weighing whether to integrate
Huawei technologies into their infrastructure despite security
concerns. For example, the ruling party of Germany in early
2020 backed a position paper that pushed for more stringent
regulation of foreign technologies in its 5G networks but did
not ban the use of Huawei components.\139\ Furthermore,
Germany's three primary telecommunications firms, while
deciding to remove Huawei from its core networks, will continue
to utilize Huawei technologies on peripheral radio access
networks.\140\ Brazil, another U.S. partner, faces an upcoming
decision on whether Huawei should be further involved in
Brazil's infrastructure as Brazil prepares to auction spectrum
for 5G in late 2020.\141\ In July 2019, Brazil's Vice President
Hamilton Mourao told reporters that the country would not
restrict Huawei on 5G, extending a decade-long
relationship.\142\ In an example of that relationship, Huawei
supports an Internet of Things laboratory in Sao Paulo state
and is looking to build a smartphone assembly plant.\143\ While
security concerns have been raised by Eduardo Bolsonaro, a
lawmaker and son of Brazil's president, it remains to be seen
how Brazil manages Huawei's involvement in its domestic 5G
moving forward, especially in light of Foreign Minister Ernesto
Araujo reportedly arguing for a Huawei 5G ban to President
Bolsonaro.\144\ Meanwhile, Mexico and Argentina plan to start
Latin America's first 5G networks in 2020 and are considering
allowing Huawei participation.\145\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\139\ Andreas Rinke, ``Merkel's conservatives stop short of Huawei
5G ban in Germany,'' Reuters, Feb. 11, 2020.
\140\ Douglas Busvine & Thomas Seythal, ``Telefonica Deutschland
picks Ericsson for 5G core network,'' Reuters, June 2, 2020.
\141\ Anthony Boadle, ``Huawei role in Brazil 5G up to national
security chief: regulator,'' Reuters, Feb. 18, 2020.
\142\ ``Defying US, Brazil Allows Huawei to Move Forward with 5G
Network,'' Al Jazeera, July 15, 2019.
\143\ Oliver Stuenkel, ``Huawei Heads South: The Battle over 5G
Comes to Latin America,'' Foreign Affairs, May 10, 2019.
\144\ Anthony Boadle, ``Huawei role in Brazil 5G up to national
security chief: regulator,'' Reuters, Feb. 18, 2020; Eduardo Baptista,
``China-Brazil trade on track, but Huawei tension may be threat to
relations,'' South China Morning Post, June 21, 2020, https://
www.scmp.com/news/china/article/3089903/china-brazil-trade-track-
huawei-tension-may-be-threat-relations.
\145\ Oliver Stuenkel, ``Huawei Heads South: The Battle over 5G
Comes to Latin America,'' Foreign Affairs, May 10, 2019; Andres
Schipani et al., ``Latin America resists US pressure to exclude
Huawei,'' Financial Times, June 9, 2019.
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Huawei's 5G push continues to see success in other
countries, especially ones in China's Belt and Road Initiative,
highlighting the company's ability to dominate the 5G space by
providing networks for prices estimated to be 30 percent less
than its competitors.\146\ For example:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\146\ Lindsay Maizland & Andrew Chatzky, ``Huawei: China's
Controversial Tech Giant,'' Council on Foreign Relations, June 12,
2019.
Malaysia is not barring Huawei from spectrum bids relating
to its 5G rollout, saying that security decisions will
be made by its ``own safety standards'';\147\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\147\ Joseph Sipalan & Krishna N. Das, ``Malaysia to choose 5G
partners based on own security standards,'' Reuters, Feb. 17, 2020.
In Thailand, Huawei offered to build a tech training center
in Bangkok as a means of enticing Thailand to allow
Huawei to build its 5G network;\148\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\148\ Apornrath Phoonphongphiphat, ``Huawei sweetens 5G offer in
Thailand with tech training center,'' Nikkei Asian Review, November 18,
2019, https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/5G-networks/Huawei-sweetens-5G-
offer-in-Thailand-with-tech-training-center; Takashi Kawakami, ``China
closes in on 70% of world's 5G subscribers,'' Nikkei Asian Review, May
12, 2020, https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/5G-networks/China-closes-
in-on-70-of-world-s-5G-subscribers.
In Italy, Huawei offered to provide cloud computing
services that would link Italian hospitals both with
each other and with hospitals in Wuhan in response to
the COVID-19 pandemic;\149\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\149\ Theresa Fallon, ``China, Italy, and Coronavirus: Geopolitics
and Propaganda,'' The Diplomat, Mar. 20, 2020.
Unnamed sources reported in March 2020 that as part of its
5G rollout, France's cybersecurity agency, ANSSI, will
allow Huawei equipment to be used for non-core elements
of France's network;\150\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\150\ Mathieu Rosemain & Gwenaelle Barzic, ``Exclusive: France to
allow some Huawei gear in its 5G network--sources,'' Reuters, Mar. 12,
2020.
Russia is building out its 5G network with Huawei's
help;\151\
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\151\ Zak Doffman, ``Huawei Just Launched 5G In Russia With Putin's
Support: 'Hello Splinternet','' Forbes, Sept. 1, 2019.
The Washington Post reported that Huawei is building out
North Korea's wireless network.\152\ Huawei stated that
it does not have a business presence in North Korea,
but did not dispute the reporting done by The
Washington Post;\153\
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\152\ Ellen Nakashima et al., ``Leaked documents reveal Huawei's
secret operations to build North Korea's wireless network,'' The
Washington Post, July 22, 2019; Emily Stewart, ``A New Reason to Worry
About Huawei: It's Been Building North Korea's Wireless Networks,''
Vox, July 22, 2019, https://www.vox.com/recode/2019/7/22/20704196/
huawei-north-korea-washington-post-sanctions-panda.
\153\ Ellen Nakashima et al., ``Leaked documents reveal Huawei's
secret operations to build North Korea's wireless network,'' The
Washington Post, July 22, 2019.
Even some small U.S. rural telecom companies have used
Huawei equipment.\154\
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\154\ Jeanne Whalen, ``Huawei helped bring Internet to small-town
America. Now its equipment has to go,'' The Washington Post, Oct. 10,
2019.
By building out so much of the digital infrastructure in
the developing world, China could end up dominating a large
portion of the global communications market, positioning it to
potentially pressure other governments or conduct
espionage.\155\ Indeed, multiple governments that purchase or
rely on Chinese technologies also enact tough restraints on
free speech or engage in illiberal activities, such as spying
on political opponents, and there have been suspicious data
transfers from Chinese-built IT systems.\156\ For example, in
2017, technicians working at the African Union headquarters in
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, discovered that servers in the building,
built by a Chinese company with Chinese funding, had for years
been transmitting massive quantities of data to China, making
even the most sensitive material vulnerable to Chinese
exploitation.\157\ Despite these incidents and diplomatic
warnings, however, many countries--both developing and
developed--calculate that access to low-cost, good-quality data
networks and hardware outweighs the potential risks.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\155\ See, e.g., Zak Doffman, ``CIA Claims It Has Proof Huawei Has
Been Funded By China's Military and Intelligence,'' Forbes, Apr. 20,
2019; Isobel Asher Hamilton, ``Researchers Studied 25,000 Leaked Huawei
Resumes and Found Troubling Links to the Government and Spies,''
Business Insider, July 8, 2019, https://www.businessinsider.com/huawei-
study-finds-connections-between-staff-and-chinese-intelligence-2019-7.
\156\ Steven Feldstein, ``When it Comes to Digital
Authoritarianism, China is a Challenge--But Not the Only Challenge,''
War on the Rocks, Feb. 12, 2020, https://warontherocks.com/2020/02/
when-it-comes-to-digital-authoritarianism-china-is-a-challenge-but-not-
the-only-challenge/; Josh Chin, ``The Internet, Divided Between the
U.S. and China, Has Become a Battleground,'' The Wall Street Journal,
Feb. 9, 2019.
\157\ Joan Tilouine & Ghalia Kadiri, ``A Addis-Abeba, le siege de
l'Union africaine espionne par Pekin,'' Le Monde, Jan. 26, 2018,
https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2018/01/26/a-addis-abeba-le-
siege-de-l-union-africaine-espionne-par-les-chinois--5247521--
3212.html; Mailyn Fidler, ``African Union Bugged by China: Cyber
Espionage as Evidence of Strategic Shifts,'' Council on Foreign
Relations, Mar. 7, 2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As noted above, China's export and infrastructure efforts
around the globe represent an economic concern for the United
States. However, China's export of digital technology in and of
itself is not the key issue, as it is only the groundwork upon
which digital authoritarianism can flourish. What really
advances this censorship and surveillance system is China
providing countries with social control systems that run on
exported digital technologies, including relevant training and
expertise.
In its report, Freedom on the Net 2018, Freedom House
highlights how, during 2018, the Chinese government hosted
media officials from dozens of countries for seminars on its
system of censorship and surveillance.\158\ Outside experts
have little visibility into the details of these trainings, but
governments who participate frequently return home to pass
cybersecurity laws very similar to those in China.\159\
Furthermore, Chinese companies have supplied many governments--
at least some of which have poor human rights records or a
tendency towards autocracy--with advanced facial recognition
technology and data analytics tools that can be easily
exploited by repressive governments and intelligence
services.\160\ For example:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\158\ Adrian Shahbaz, Freedom on the Net 2018: The Rise of Digital
Authoritarianism, Freedom House (Oct. 31, 2018), https://bit.ly/
2IYJkJE.
\159\ Id.. Vietnam, Uganda, and Tanzania all introduced
cybersecurity laws resembling China's following such seminars. Id. See
Also Abdi Latif Dahir, ``China is Exporting its Digital Surveillance
Methods to African Countries,'' Quartz Africa, Nov. 1, 2018; Josh Chin,
``The Internet, Divided Between the U.S. and China, Has Become a
Battleground,'' The Wall Street Journal, Feb. 9, 2019.
\160\ Daniel Benaim and Hollie Russon Gilman, ``China's Aggressive
Surveillance Technology Will Spread Beyond Its Borders,'' Slate, Aug.
9, 2018.
The Chinese startup CloudWalk is partnering with the
Zimbabwean government on a mass facial recognition
program in Zimbabwe;\161\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\161\ Shan Jie, ``China exports facial ID technology to Zimbabwe,''
Global Times, Apr. 12, 2018, http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/
1097747.shtml; Abdi Latif Dahir, ``China is Exporting its Digital
Surveillance Methods to African Countries,'' Quartz Africa, Nov. 1,
2018.
Huawei is advising Kenya on its information and
communication technology (ICT) Master Plan and Vision
2030;\162\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\162\ Abdi Latif Dahir, ``China is Exporting its Digital
Surveillance Methods to African Countries,'' Quartz Africa, Nov. 1,
2018; Huawei, ``Kenya,'' https://www.huawei.com/us/about-huawei/
sustainability/win-win-development/social-contribution/seeds-for-the-
future/kenya (last visited June 7, 2020).
In Mauritius, Huawei is installing 4,000 cameras;\163\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\163\ Sheridan Prasso, ``China's Digital Silk Road is Looking More
Like an Iron Curtain, Bloomberg, Jan. 10, 2019.
Zambia is spending $1 billion on Chinese-made
telecommunications, broadcasting, and surveillance
technology;\164\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\164\ Id.
Chinese start-up Yitu bid for a contract for facial
recognition cameras in Singapore and opened its first
international office in Singapore in January 2019.\165\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\165\ Anna Gross et al., ``Chinese tech groups shaping UN facial
recognition standards,'' Financial Times, Dec. 1, 2019; Amanda Lentino,
``This Chinese facial recognition start-up can identify a person in
seconds,'' CNBC, May 16, 2019.
These examples highlight a few Chinese efforts to expand
digital authoritarianism. To more fully show how China's
approach of economic advancement and authoritarian outreach is
extending digital authoritarianism to new countries, this
report delves into four case studies that underscore China's
efforts to not only provide technologies to other nations, but
also to work with these countries to perfect methods of social
control that imitate China's own patterns of digital
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
authoritarianism.
----------
Case Study: Venezuela
The regime of disputed Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro
takes full advantage of Chinese hardware and services in its
effort to control Venezuelan citizens. Venezuela has Internet
and mobile networking equipment, intelligent monitoring
systems, and facial recognition technology developed and
installed by Chinese companies, and regime officials have
traveled to China to participate in seminars on information
management.\166\ The regime uses these technologies to censor
and control its critics by blocking social media platforms and
political content, using pro-regime commentators to manipulate
online discussions, stifling content critical of Maduro,
increasing surveillance of citizens, tracking and detaining
government critics, and accessing the data of human rights
organizations.\167\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\166\ Angus Berwick, ``How ZTE Helps Venezuela Create China-Style
Social Control,'' Reuters Investigates, Nov. 14, 2018; Paul Mozur et
al., ``Made in China, Exported to the World: The Surveillance State,''
The New York Times, Apr. 24, 2019.
\167\ ``Venezuela / Protests: UN and IACHR Rapporteurs condemn
censorship, arrests and attacks on journalists,'' UN Human Rights--
Office of the High Commissioner, Apr. 26, 2017, https://www.ohchr.org/
en/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=21535&LangID=E; Angus
Berwick, ``How ZTE Helps Venezuela Create China-Style Social Control,''
Reuters Investigates, Nov. 14, 2018; ``Freedom on the Net 2019:
Venezuela,'' Freedom House, https://freedomhouse.org/country/venezuela/
freedom-net/2019 (last visited July 10, 2020); Moises Rendon & Arianna
Kohan, ``The Internet: Venezuela's Lifeline,'' Center for Strategic and
International Studies, Dec. 4, 2019.
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ZTE helped the regime create Venezuela's Carnet de la
Patria (Fatherland Card). Critics have labeled the card as a
new option for the Maduro regime to exert increased social
control over its population (such as determining who receives
subsidized food or health services), especially against those
the regime considers political opponents.\168\ The initial idea
began more than a decade ago as a standardized ID for voting or
opening a bank account.\169\ However, as Venezuela's economic
and political crisis deepened, the regime used it to track
Comites Locales de Abastecimiento y Produccion (Local
Committees for Supply and Production, or CLAP) boxes, the
subsidized food packages the government began distributing in
2016.\170\ ZTE in 2017 also received an undisclosed portion of
$70 million to build out a centralized database and mobile
payment system for the card in an effort to bolster ``national
security.''\171\ By late 2018, a team of ZTE employees was
embedded in a special unit of Venezuela's state
telecommunications company that oversees the management of the
database.\172\ According to employees of the entity that
manages the card system, the database stores birthdays, family
information, employment and income, property owned, medical
history, state benefits received, presence on social media,
political party membership, and voting records.\173\ To
encourage people to sign up for the card, the Maduro regime has
granted ``cash prizes to cardholders for performing civic
duties, like rallying voters.''\174\ However, the regime also
made it mandatory for anyone wanting to receive public benefits
such as medicine, subsidized fuel, and pensions.\175\ Once the
card became the way to sign up for much-needed services, its
adoption was generally assured, and the Maduro regime claims
that over half of the population retains a Fatherland
Card.\176\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\168\ Laura Vidal, ``Venezuelans fear 'Fatherland Card' may be a
new form of social control,'' The World, Dec. 28, 2018, https://
www.pri.org/stories/2018-12-28/venezuelans-fear-fatherland-card-may-be-
new-form-social-control.
\169\ Angus Berwick, ``How ZTE Helps Venezuela Create China-Style
Social Control,'' Reuters Investigates, Nov. 14, 2018.
\170\ Jim Wyss & Cody Weddle, ``Venezuela's Maduro aims to turn
empty stomachs into full ballot boxes,'' Miami Herald, May 16, 2018.
See also Press Release, U.S. Department of Treasury, ``Treasury
Disrupts Corruption Network Stealing From Venezuela's Food Distribution
Program, CLAP,'' July 25, 2019.
\171\ Angus Berwick, ``How ZTE Helps Venezuela Create China-Style
Social Control,'' Reuters Investigates, Nov. 14, 2018.
\172\ Id.
\173\ Id.
\174\ Id.
\175\ Id.
\176\ Id.; Jim Wyss & Cody Weddle, ``Venezuela's Maduro aims to
turn empty stomachs into full ballot boxes,'' Miami Herald, May 16,
2018.
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Using information gathered through enrollment and card
transactions, the regime is creating and growing a database
that could be a powerful tool for identifying, harassing, and
silencing Maudro's critics. Current and former employees of
Cantv, Venezuela's state telephone and Internet provider, told
Reuters that the card still only records if a person voted--not
how they voted--but there is evidence that government agencies
are tracking whether government employees are voting.\177\ ZTE
is also supporting the Maduro regime by taking on projects that
government-owned enterprises can no longer manage. As of 2015,
ZTE was helping build six emergency response centers monitoring
Venezuela's major cities, and since 2016 it has been working to
centralize the government's video surveillance.\178\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\177\ Angus Berwick, ``How ZTE Helps Venezuela Create China-Style
Social Control,'' Reuters Investigates, Nov. 14, 2018.
\178\ Id.
----------
Case Study: Central Asia
In April 2019, the Uzbek government signed a $1 billion
deal with Huawei to expand surveillance operations in the
country.\179\ At the time, the capital city of Tashkent had 883
cameras that authorities used to record and analyze movements
while automatically reporting road violations such as
speeding.\180\ Under the new agreement, Huawei will upgrade the
cameras to ``digitally manage political affairs.''\181\
Similarly, Huawei aided the implementation of Tajikistan's
``safe city'' project in Dushanbe in 2013, providing $22
million (primarily a $20.91 million loan) for the installation
of cameras along roads and overseeing monuments and parks.\182\
China also owns TK mobile, one of the five telecommunications
providers in Tajikistan, and Huawei is the main technology
supplier for Kyrgyzstan's top telecommunication providers.\183\
Although the Kyrgyz government withdrew from Huawei's $60
million ``safe cities'' project in March 2018, it later chose a
Russian company, Vega, to implement the first phase of a
similar traffic monitoring system in November 2018.\184\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\179\ ``Huawei and CITIC Guoan invest over US$1 billion to develop
Uzbekistan's digital infrastructure,'' Xiangshi Xinwen Wang (Detailed
News) via Silu Xin Guancha (Silk Road New Observer), Apr. 26, 2019,
http://web.siluxgc.com/UZ/20190426/16656.html (translated from
Chinese); Yau Tsz Yan, ``Smart Cities or Surveillance? Huawei in
Central Asia,'' The Diplomat, Aug. 7, 2019.
\180\ Yau Tsz Yan, ``Smart Cities or Surveillance? Huawei in
Central Asia,'' The Diplomat, Aug. 7, 2019.
\181\ Id.
\182\ Id.; Liu Ruowei, ``Millions of Roads, Safety First: The
Central Asian `Safe City' project is here!,'' Silu Xin Guangcha (Silk
Road New Observer) on WeChat, Feb. 13, 2019, https://mp.weixin.qq.com/
s/z3l--UHX40W8OIJi61HaomA (translated from Chinese).
\183\ Yau Tsz Yan, ``Smart Cities or Surveillance? Huawei in
Central Asia,'' The Diplomat, Aug. 7, 2019; ``Announcement on providing
guarantee for holding subsidiaries,'' ZTE Corporation, May 11, 2019,
https://bit.ly/3a7lbMb.
\184\ Yau Tsz Yan, ``Smart Cities or Surveillance? Huawei in
Central Asia,'' The Diplomat, Aug. 7, 2019; ``The Kyrgyz government
suddenly announced the termination of the ``smart city'' project,
China's Huawei has not yet responded,'' Kabar, Mar. 18, 2015, http://
cn.kabar.kg/news/2-8/ (translated from Chinese); ``Vega successfully
completes first round of Safe City program in Bishkek,'' Vega, May 20,
2019, https://www.vega.su/press-room/?ELEMENT--ID=2216 (translated from
Russian).
----------
Case Study: Ecuador
The Ecuador example illustrates how, even if democratic
institutions prevail, vestiges of China's influence persist.
Former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa, the autocratic
leftist and ally of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez,
left office in 2017 but the surveillance system he installed
remains in use.\185\ Correa learned of China's surveillance
technology after Ecuadorian officials visiting Beijing for the
2008 Olympics received a tour of Beijing's surveillance
system.\186\ Three years later, the Ecuadorian government began
installing a system of high-powered cameras throughout the
country for the stated purpose of reducing crime.\187\ This
system sends images to 16 monitoring centers that employ more
than 3,000 people.\188\ China guaranteed state funding and
loans for the project, and in return, Ecuador committed to
exporting ``large portions of its oil reserves'' to China,
underscoring another key point: China's utilization of
predatory lending and technological knowledge to receive other
benefits.\189\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\185\ ``Ecuador 'rejects unlimited election terms', blocking Correa
return,'' BBC, Feb. 5, 2018.
\186\ Paul Mozur et al., ``Made in China, Exported to the World:
The Surveillance State,'' The New York Times, Apr. 24, 2019.
\187\ Id.
\188\ Id.
\189\ Id.; Clifford Krauss & Keith Bradsher, ``China's Global
Ambitions, Cash and Strings Attached,'' The New York Times, July 24,
2015.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Two Chinese companies, Huawei and China National
Electronics Import & Export Corporation (CEIEC), primarily
built Ecuador's surveillance system.\190\ In addition to
recording events, the monitoring system offers Ecuadorian
authorities the ability to track phones and, according to the
New York Times, may be equipped with facial-recognition
capabilities in the future.\191\ As part of the process of
fully integrating these technologies into Ecuador's
infrastructure, China engaged in a training operation in which
Ecuadorian officials visited China and Chinese engineers
educated Ecuadorian engineers on how to manage the system.\192\
The Ecuador project created a toehold in the region: Ecuador's
decision to install the equipment prompted the Venezuelan and
Bolivian governments to follow suit, and soon after, Venezuela
installed a larger version that aimed to include 30,000
cameras.\193\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\190\ Paul Mozur et al., ``Made in China, Exported to the World:
The Surveillance State,'' The New York Times, Apr. 24, 2019.
\191\ Id.
\192\ Id.
\193\ Id.; ``Venezuela will replicate the Ecuadorian model of the
Integrated Security System Ecu-911,'' National Service for Risk and
Emergency Management of Ecuador, Dec. 25, 2013, https://
www.gestionderiesgos.gob.ec/venezuela-replicara-modelo-ecuatoriano-del-
sistema-integrado-de-seguridad-ecu-911/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Although Correa's successor, President Lenin Moreno, has
worked to reverse many of Correa's autocratic policies, the
surveillance system is still operational and holds the
potential for abuse. When New York Times reporters had the
opportunity to see in person the 800-camera operation in Quito,
there were only 30 police officers available to check camera
footage, and anecdotal reports suggest crimes continue to take
place in plain view of cameras.\194\ Moreover, the recordings
are also available to Ecuador's domestic intelligence agency,
the National Intelligence Secretariat (SENAIN), which has a
history of harassing and tracking political opponents.\195\
Indeed, given the small number of police available to monitor
crime-prone locations, the system is probably better suited to
spying on individuals than fending off criminality.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\194\ Paul Mozur et al., ``Made in China, Exported to the World:
The Surveillance State,'' The New York Times, Apr. 24, 2019.
\195\ Id.
----------
Case Study: Zimbabwe
China is also leveraging the deployment of surveillance
technology overseas to improve its products' functionality.
Studies have shown that facial recognition systems developed in
Western nations tend to perform better on Caucasian faces and
those developed in East Asian nations tend to perform better on
their respective populations.\196\ While Western technology
companies are grappling with how to teach machines about race,
their Chinese counterparts are using their customer base in
Africa to help develop advanced capabilities that differentiate
by race.\197\ For example, in March 2018, the Zimbabwean
government agreed to a partnership to develop facial
recognition programs in the country with CloudWalk Technology,
a startup located in Guangzhou.\198\ Additionally, Zimbabwe
entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with Hikvision in
which the Chinese company would donate facial recognition
cameras and software for use at border posts, airports, and
state entry points in Zimbabwe.\199\ Partnerships such as these
provide Chinese companies with the opportunity to develop and
refine their databases with different ethnicities and
demographics, in Zimbabwe's case a majority-Black population,
while enticing the country with technological
modernization.\200\ A key consequence of such partnerships,
according to Quartz reporter Lynsey Chutel, is Chinese
companies ``getting ahead of US and European developers'' on
facial recognition.\201\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\196\ P. Jonathon Phillips et al., An Other-Race Effect for Face
Recognition Algorithms, Association for Computing Machinery (Feb.
2011), https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/1870076.1870082; Steve Lohr,
``Facial Recognition is Accurate, if You're a White Guy,'' The New York
Times, Feb. 9, 2018; Clare Garvie & Jonathan Frankle, ``Facial-
Recognition Software Might Have a Racial Bias Problem,'' The Atlantic,
Apr. 7, 2016.
\197\ Lynsey Chutel, ``China is Exporting Facial Recognition
Software to Africa, Expanding its Vast Database,'' Quartz Africa, May
25, 2018.
\198\ Id.; Zhang Hongpei, ``Chinese Facial ID Tech to Land in
Africa,'' Global Times, May 17, 2018, http://www.globaltimes.cn/
content/1102797.shtml; Shan Jie, ``China exports facial ID technology
to Zimbabwe,'' Global Times, April 12, 2018, http://www.globaltimes.cn/
content/1097747.shtml.
\199\ Farai Mudzingwa, ``Government Acknowledges Facial Recognition
System In The Works,'' TechZim, June 13, 2018, https://
www.techzim.co.zw/2018/06/government-acknowledges-facial-recognition-
system-in-the-works/.
\200\ Lynsey Chutel, ``China is Exporting Facial Recognition
Software to Africa, Expanding its Vast Database,'' Quartz Africa, May
25, 2018.
\201\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
A Global Challenge
The situations described above are key examples of how
China is using economic and, more importantly, geopolitical and
outreach tools to stimulate the growth of digital
authoritarianism in new markets and nations. Although most
China tech-watchers agree that the use of Chinese surveillance
and censorship systems around the world is growing, they differ
on how many are in use, and, given the proliferation of
Chinese-built telecommunications equipment, how widely their
use may ultimately reach. According to Steven Feldstein, former
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State at the Bureau for
Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, ``Huawei alone is
responsible for providing AI [artificial intelligence]
surveillance technology to at least fifty countries
worldwide.''\202\ When Huawei's efforts are combined with
Hikvision, Dahua, and ZTE's efforts, Chinese companies supply
AI surveillance technology in sixty-three countries, thirty-six
of which are part of BRI.\203\ Experts are still trying to
assess the long-term consequences of China's technological
expansion; Feldstein also notes that China is exporting AI-
equipped surveillance technology to governments ranging from
closed authoritarian systems to flawed democracies.\204\ In an
article on the proliferation of Chinese-made surveillance
systems, Foreign Policy cites a Huawei study, which has been
removed from the company's website, in which ``the company
boasted that it had already deployed its `Safe City' system in
230 cities around the world, for more than 90 national or
regional governments.''\205\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\202\ Steven Feldstein, ``The Global Expansion of AI
Surveillance,'' Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Sept. 17,
2019.
\203\ Id.
\204\ Id.; Steven Feldstein, ``China is Exporting AI Surveillance
Technology to Countries Around the World,'' Newsweek, Apr. 23, 2019.
\205\ Bojan Stojkovski, ``Big Brother Comes to Belgrade,'' Foreign
Policy, June 18, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Due to China's efforts at proliferating the technologies
and methodologies of digital authoritarianism, the United
States finds itself in an intensifying battle over the global
ICT sector. China's export of ICT infrastructure, its ability
to deliver lower-priced, reliable access to telecommunications
network technology, and its competitive edge in 5G combine to
mount a strong challenge to the U.S. to become the biggest
provider of 5G services to the world. Not only do these efforts
provide China with a competitive edge both commercially and, in
a potential conflict, militarily, they also offer even greater
leverage to push client countries to adopt the Chinese approach
to the Internet and the regulation of speech. Consequently, the
United States must proactively defend a free, democratic model
for the digital domain and Internet governance and push back
against China's malign activities abroad.
However, it is not enough for the United States to take a
purely defensive posture against China's digital
authoritarianism. It is critical that the United States
government stimulate technological innovation in the United
States by increasing government research and development
funding, adopting a more extensive industrial policy,
developing and attracting superior talent to the United States'
technology sector, strengthening bilateral and multilateral
technology initiatives with like-minded allies and partners,
and ensuring a competitive advantage for domestic companies in
overseas markets. By doing so, the United States and its allies
can open up more opportunities to create and deploy emerging
technologies that can outcompete Chinese products and services
and thereby undercut its ability to export digital
authoritarianism. If the United States does not develop and
implement an all-encompassing strategy for combatting China and
its cyber efforts, the United States will cede the global cyber
domain to our Pacific adversary and open up a future in which
digital authoritarianism becomes the global norm, leaving the
United States and its allies vulnerable and placing countless
more individuals under the thumb of digital authoritarianism.
Chapter 3: Institutionalizing Digital Authoritarianism--China at
International Fora
----------
In addition to using heavily-subsidized technology to
purchase political influence in countries around the world,
China continues to use diplomacy and various international
domains to further its authoritarian goals. Its objective: to
set the rules and norms around the governance of digital
technologies. From the United Nations (UN) to the World Trade
Organization (WTO), China has used its political and economic
muscle to shape the international standards surrounding the
digital domain in favor of a more authoritarian view of the
world.
Since General Secretary Xi came into power in 2012, the
cyber realm has become an increasingly important strategic
domain.\206\ Adam Segal of the Council on Foreign Relations
wrote that, since then, the CCP's goals have been threefold:
``limit the threat that the Internet and the flow of
information may pose to domestic stability and regime
legitimacy; shape cyberspace to extend Beijing's political,
military, and economic influence; and counter US advantages in
cyberspace while increasing China's room to maneuver.''\207\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\206\ See, e.g., James A. Lewis & Simon Hansen, China's
Cyberpower--International and domestic priorities, Australian Strategic
Policy Institute, at 1 (Nov. 2014), https://bit.ly/2UTtZMQ.
\207\ Adam Segal ``Chinese Cyber Diplomacy in a New Era of
Uncertainty,'' Hoover Institution, June 2017, https://hvr.co/374oSiA.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
According to a report prepared for the United States-China
Economic and Security Review Commission in 2018, China uses:
[A] comprehensive techno-nationalist strategy that
coordinates Chinese efforts to gain leading roles in
international standards organizations while also using
state funding to allow Chinese companies to undersell
their competitors in developed economies and win
infrastructure contracts in developing markets,
ensuring that its indigenously-developed technologies
and standards become widely adopted with or without
international recognition.\208\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\208\ John Chen et al., China's Internet of Things, Research Report
Prepared on Behalf of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review
Commission, by SOS International (SOSi), at 69 (Oct. 2018).
Above all else, China is heavily focused on ensuring its
digital sovereignty, as indicated by its presence as the second
``principle'' (following ``peace'' as the first) in their 2017
International Strategy of Cooperation on Cyberspace.\209\ In
the strategy, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) and
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs argues for digital sovereignty
and states that ``[n]o country should pursue cyber
hegemony.''\210\ It appears, as evidenced by its efforts in a
number of different international forums, that China's idea of
not pursuing ``cyber hegemony'' applies to every country other
than China.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\209\ Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of
China, ``International Strategy of Cooperation on Cyberspace--March
2017,'' Mar. 1, 2017, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa--eng/wjb--663304/
zzjg--663340/jks--665232/kjlc--665236/qtwt--665250/t1442390.shtml.
\210\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
Definition:
Digital Sovereignty--At the Opening Ceremony of the
International Workshop on Information and Cyber
Security in June 2014, Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodang
stated that sovereignty in cyberspace, which this
report refers to as digital sovereignty, comprises the
following factors: ``states['] own jurisdiction over
the ICT infrastructure and activities within their
territories; national governments are entitled to
making public policies for the Internet based on their
national conditions; no country shall use the Internet
to interfere in other countries' internal affairs or
undermine other countries' interests.''\211\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\211\ Press Release, Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong, ``Address by
Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong at the Opening Ceremony of the
International Workshop on Information and Cyber Security,'' June 5,
2014, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa--eng/wjbxw/t1162458.shtml.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
The United Nations
At the United Nations, China has played a counterproductive
role in efforts to build consensus on a free and fair future of
cyberspace. China's behavior echoes its consistent undermining
of UN efforts that could highlight its own poor human rights
record.\212\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\212\ See, e.g., Lindsay Maizland, ``Is China Undermining Human
Rights at the United Nations?'' Council on Foreign Relations, July 9,
2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In 2011, China--along with Russia, Tajikistan, and
Uzbekistan--submitted a draft resolution on an international
code of conduct for information security to the 2011 United
Nations General Assembly.\213\ The resolution, which was later
enhanced and resubmitted in 2015 by a slightly larger group of
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member countries,
emphasizes the sovereignty and stability of individual states
within the digital space to the extent that it raises
significant human rights concerns, detailed below.\214\ The
resolution explicitly says it aims to ``push forward the
international debate on international norms on information
security, and help forge an early consensus on this
issue.''\215\ In other words, the resolution is China's attempt
to make itself the leader on these norms.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\213\ Letter Dated 12 September 2011 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, and
Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed to the Secretary-General
(93), U.N. General Assembly, 66th Session, Sept. 14, 2011, https://
undocs.org/A/66/359.
\214\ Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian
Federation, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed
to the Secretary-General (91), U.N. General Assembly, 69th Session,
Jan. 13, 2015, https://undocs.org/A/69/723; see, e.g., Sarah McKune,
``An Analysis of the International Code of Conduct for Information
Security,'' The Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public
Policy, University of Toronto, Sept. 28, 2015, https://citizenlab.ca/
2015/09/international-code-of-conduct/.
\215\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Both the 2011 and 2015 versions of the draft resolution
commit the signatories to ``curbing the dissemination of
information that incites terrorism, secessionism or extremism
or that undermines other countries' political, economic, and
social stability, as well as their spiritual and cultural
environment.''\216\ According to Milton Mueller of the Internet
Governance Project at the Georgia Institute of Technology
School of Public Policy, this section would:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\216\ Letter Dated 12 September 2011 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, and
Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed to the Secretary-General
(93), U.N. General Assembly, 66th Session, Sept. 14, 2011, https://
undocs.org/A/66/359. See also Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the
Permanent Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian
Federation, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed
to the Secretary-General (91), U.N. General Assembly, 69th Session,
Jan. 13, 2015, https://undocs.org/A/69/723.
[G]ive any state the right to censor or block
international communications for almost any reason.
Such as . . . Facebook mobilizations against dictators,
dissident blogs, etc. ``Undermining the spiritual and
cultural environment'' in particular could be used to
filter out any views a government didn't like, and
could even be used for trade protectionism in cultural
industries.\217\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\217\ Milton Mueller, ``Russia & China propose UN General Assembly
Resolution on `information security,' '' Internet Governance Project--
Georgia Tech University, Sept. 20, 2011, https://
www.internetgovernance.org/2011/09/20/russia-china-propose-un-general-
assembly-resolution-on-information-security/.
The significant revisions between the 2011 Code of Conduct
and the 2015 Code of Conduct involve several references to a
report by the 2012 UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE),
Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications
in the Context of International Security.\218\ The GGEs, which
fall under the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs
and consist of selected member states, have initiated six
separate working groups since 2004 to ``examine[] existing and
potential threats in the cyber-sphere and possible cooperative
measures to address them,'' with each group's work intended to
build upon the last.\219\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\218\ See Letter Dated 12 September 2011 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, and
Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed to the Secretary-General
(93), U.N. General Assembly, 66th Session,] Sept. 14, 2011, https://
undocs.org/A/66/359; Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian
Federation, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed
to the Secretary-General (91), U.N. General Assembly, 69th Session,
Jan. 13, 2015, https://undocs.org/A/69/723; U.N. General Assembly,
Group of Governmental Experts on Developments in the Field of
Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International
Security--Note by the Secretary-General, 68th Session, Agenda item 94
(June. 24, 2013), https://undocs.org/A/68/98.
\219\ United Nations, ``Developments in the Field of Information
and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security--
December 2018,'' https://www.un.org/disarmament/ict-security/ (last
visited July 15, 2020). See also United Nations Office for Disarmament
Affairs (UNODA), ``Fact Sheet: Developments In the Field of Information
and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security,'' Jul.
2019, https://unoda-web.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/
Information-Security-Fact-Sheet-July-2019.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The GGEs have been viewed as the best tool to achieve
success--albeit incremental--at the UN on democratic digital
standards.\220\ However, contrary to that view, the report by
the GGE established in 2012 was favorably referenced by the
China-led SCO's Code of Conduct resolution several times in
2015.\221\ According to Sarah McKune, Senior Legal Advisor at
the Citizen Lab, SCO states looked favorably on that GGE's
report because of the ``recognition of sovereignty and
territoriality in the digital space.''\222\ The SCO's newfound
appreciation for the 2012-13 GGE in their resolution may have
led to the increased disputes in a later GGE--the 2016-2017
GGE--that collapsed discussions and prevented the Group from
issuing a consensus report at its conclusion.\223\ Following
the 2016-17 GGE dissipation, the United States led a resolution
to authorize the creation of a new 2019-21 GGE, which continues
to meet periodically and is expected to conclude in May
2021.\224\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\220\ See, e.g., John Sullivan, Deputy Secretary of State, Remarks
at the ``Second Ministerial Meeting on Advancing Responsible State
Behavior in Cyberspace,'' New York, New York, Sept. 23, 2019.
\221\ ``Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the Permanent
Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian
Federation, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed
to the Secretary-General (91)'' U.N. General Assembly, 69th Session,
Jan. 13, 2015, https://undocs.org/A/69/723; See, e,g,. Sarah McKune,
``An Analysis of the International Code of Conduct for Information
Security,'' The Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public
Policy, University of Toronto, Sept. 28, 2015, https://citizenlab.ca/
2015/09/international-code-of-conduct/.
\222\ Sarah McKune, ``An Analysis of the International Code of
Conduct for Information Security,'' The Citizen Lab, Munk School of
Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto, Sept. 28,
2015, https://citizenlab.ca/2015/09/international-code-of-conduct/.
\223\ Elaine Korzak, ``UN GGE on Cybersecurity: The End of an
Era?,'' The Diplomat, July 21, 2017.
\224\ United Nations, ``Group of Government Experts,'' Dec. 2018,
https://www.un.org/disarmament/group-of-governmental-experts/; Alex
Grigsby, ``The United Nations Doubles Its Workload on Cyber Norms, and
Not Everyone Is Pleased,'' Council on Foreign Relations, Nov. 15, 2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In addition to the GGEs, China may find another short-term
mechanism to push its agenda of digital authoritarianism in the
Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG). In December 2018, the UN
General Assembly adopted the formation of the Internet-focused
OEWG that Russia proposed.\225\ The OEWG was supposedly
convened ``with a view to making the United Nations negotiation
process on security in the use of information and
communications technologies more democratic, inclusive and
transparent.''\226\ To some, the establishment of the OEWG
could be an avenue whereby China, Russia, and their SCO allies
can challenge the progress made by the GGEs and attempt to
influence the United Nations in favor of their more
authoritarian digital policies.\227\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\225\ Alex Grigsby, ``The United Nations Doubles Its Workload on
Cyber Norms, and Not Everyone Is Pleased,'' Council on Foreign
Relations, Nov. 15, 2018; Elaine Korzak, ``What's Ahead in the Cyber
Norms Debate?,'' Lawfare, Mar. 16, 2020, https://www.lawfareblog.com/
whats-ahead-cyber-norms-debate.
\226\ U.N. General Assembly, Resolution Adopted by the General
Assembly on 5 December 2018 (96), 73rd Session, Agenda item 96 (Dec.
11, 2018), https://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view--doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/
73/27.
\227\ Emilio Iasiello, ``OEWG or GGE--Which Has the Best Shot of
Succeeding?'' Technative, Dec. 5, 2019, https://www.technative.io/oewg-
or-gge-which-has-the-best-shot-of-succeeding/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
World Trade Organization
In addition to leveraging its global influence to shape
international cyberspace guidelines at the UN, China also seeks
to use its influence to subvert World Trade Organization
regulations and norms on digital commerce. In contrast to the
United States' focus on addressing digital trade issues, China
appears unwilling to come to an agreement at the WTO over what
digital trade agreements should look like, intending to halt
decisions that, if enacted, could encroach on its domestic
digital governance.\228\ China prefers that data flows and data
storage be subjects for exploratory discussions, rather than
commitments.\229\ Further, as Nigel Cory at the Information
Technology and Innovation Foundation argued, ``China's approach
to digital trade is largely focused on applying existing WTO
rules (which are increasingly irrelevant) and a few narrow,
non-binding technical provisions.''\230\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\228\ See, e.g., Nigel Cory, Why China Should be Disqualified from
Participating in WTO Negotiations on Digital Trade Rules, Information
Technology and Innovation Foundation (Mar. 2019), https://itif.org/
publications/2019/05/09/why-china-should-be-disqualified-participating-
wto-negotiations-digital.
\229\ Congressional Research Service, Internet Regimes and WTO E-
Commerce Negotiations, at 35, Jan. 28, 2020.
\230\ Nigel Cory, Why China Should be Disqualified from
Participating in WTO Negotiations on Digital Trade Rules, Information
Technology and Innovation Foundation (Mar. 2019), https://itif.org/
publications/2019/05/09/why-china-should-be-disqualified-participating-
wto-negotiations-digital.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Most existing rules related to digital trade have not been
updated since the United Nations Commission on International
Trade Law (UNCITRAL) Model Law on Electronic Commerce in 1996,
almost 25 years ago.\231\ The Chinese government employs the
current, broad rules to its advantage. One example of this is
China's heavy emphasis on data localization, which governments
can use to increase control of, and capture more value from,
data produced within national borders.\232\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\231\ Id.; United Nations Commission on International Trade Law,
UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Commerce (1996) with additional
article 5 bis as adopted in 1998, https://uncitral.un.org/en/texts/
ecommerce/modellaw/electronic--commerce (last visited June 15, 2020).
\232\ See, e.g., ``Data Governance Part One: Emerging Data
Governance Practices,'' Foreign Policy, May 13, 2020.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The effects of China's protectionism on global trade are
concerning because, as Daniel Castro and Alan McQuinn at the
Information Technology and Innovation Foundation wrote in 2015,
data protectionism like what is practiced by China threatens:
[N]ot just the productivity, innovation, and
competiveness of tech companies, but all companies with
an international presence. In today's global economy,
it is common for businesses to process data from
customers, suppliers, and employees outside the
company's home country. Data protectionism makes such
data processing much more difficult, if not
impossible.\233\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\233\ Daniel Castro & Alan McQuinn, Cross-Border Data Flows Enable
Growth in All Industries, Information Technology & Innovation
Foundation, at 9 (Feb. 2015), http://www2.itif.org/2015-cross-border-
data-flows.pdf. See also Matthieu Pelissie du Rausas et al., ``Internet
matters: The Net's sweeping impact on growth, jobs, and prosperity,''
McKinsey and Company, May 2011, http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/high--
tech--telecoms--internet/internet--matters.
World Internet Conference
Eager to establish its technical prowess on the world
stage, China decided to launch its own global digital
technology conference in 2014, which was hosted by the
Cyberspace Administration of China.\234\ Titled the ``World
Internet Conference,'' its goal was to ``help build a
cyberspace community with a consensual shared destiny and an
ethic of respecting differences.''\235\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\234\ World Internet Conference, ``2014 WIC Overview,'' Nov. 12,
2015, http://www.wuzhenwic.org/2015-11/12/c--46284.htm.
\235\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
One of the Chinese government's goals in this first
conference was to have attendees sign the ``Wuzhen
Declaration,'' a nine-point document that echoed several
official Chinese government goals, which they hoped would
become the consensus of the attendees.\236\ However, events did
not go according to plan. As reported by the Wall Street
Journal, the draft:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\236\ Catherine Shu, ``China Tried To Get World Internet Conference
Attendees To Ratify This Ridiculous Draft Declaration,'' TechCrunch,
Nov. 21, 2014, https://techcrunch.com/2014/11/20/
worldinternetconference-declaration/;World Internet Conference, ``Draft
Wuzhen Declaration,'' Nov. 21 2014, https://www.scribd.com/document/
247566581/World-Internet-Conference-Draft-Declaration.
[W]as slipped around the midnight hour Friday under the
hotel room doors of attendees. It appeared to largely
reflect a singular view: the watchful language used by
Chinese President Xi Jinping. Chinese officials had
argued at the two-day meeting of Chinese officials and
local and foreign Internet executives that Beijing
should have sovereignty over the Internet in China and
must keep it under tight control.\237\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\237\ James T. Arredy, ``China Delivers Midnight Internet
Declaration Offline,'' The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 21, 2014.
The plan to push an agreement through at the last minute
was not successful, and the Wall Street Journal reported that
at the end of the conference, the Wuzhen Declaration ``was left
unmentioned in the final speeches.''\238\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\238\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next year, President Xi attended the second World
Internet Conference in person.\239\ There, Xi used his opening
remarks to lament the failures of the current system of
Internet governance and argue that the world should ``respect
the right of individual countries to independently choose their
own path of cyber development, model of cyber regulation and
Internet public policies, and participate in international
cyberspace governance on an equal footing.''\240\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\239\ Adam Segal, ``China's Internet Conference: Xi Jinping's
Message to Washington,'' Council on Foreign Relations, Dec. 16, 2015.
\240\ Xi Jinping, President of the People's Republic of China,
Remarks at the ``Opening Ceremony of the Second World Internet
Conference,'' Wuzhen, China, Dec. 16, 2015, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/
mfa--eng/wjdt--665385/zyjh--665391/t1327570.shtml; See also Adam Segal,
``Chinese Cyber Diplomacy in a New Era of Uncertainty,'' Hoover
Institution, June 2017, at 9, https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/
files/research/docs/segal--chinese--cyber--diplomacy.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The participation of international technology companies at
the World Internet Conference has also been a key aspect of
China's efforts within this fora, although companies'
involvement in the conference has been controversial. According
to the World Internet Conference's official website,
``prominent Internet figures from nearly 100 countries'' have
attended the conferences, including representatives from
technology companies.\241\ Such participation drew criticism
from Roseann Rife, the East Asia Research Director at Amnesty
International, who has long called for technology companies to
reject China's Internet rules, stating that ``Chinese
authorities are trying to rewrite the rules of the internet so
censorship and surveillance become the norm everywhere.''\242\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\241\ World Internet Conference, ``World Internet Conference
Overview of WIC,'' Nov. 10, 2015, http://www.wuzhenwic.org/2015-11/10/
c--46113.htm (last visited July 10, 2020). See also Adam Segal,
``Chinese Cyber Diplomacy in a New Era of Uncertainty,'' Hoover
Institution, June 2017, at 10, https://hvr.co/374oSiA.
\242\ Amnesty International, Asia and the Pacific, Internet and
Social Media, ``Tech Companies Must Reject China's Repressive Internet
Rules,'' Dec. 15, 2015, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/12/
tech-companies-must-reject-china-repressive-internet-rules/ (last
visited July 10, 2020).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fortunately for the defenders of a free and open Internet,
China has not achieved its goals through the World Internet
Conference. According to Adam Segal, ``[d]espite a significant
investment of time, money, and political capital, the reach and
influence of the World Internet Conference remain limited to
China's friends. Most of the heads of government that have
attended are from small states or the SCO.''\243\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\243\ Adam Segal, ``Chinese Cyber Diplomacy in a New Era of
Uncertainty,'' Hoover Institution, June 2017, at 1, https://
www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/research/docs/segal--chinese--
cyber--diplomacy.pdf. SCO referenced in the quote is the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
But China does not appear deterred. The 7th World Internet
Conference, tentatively scheduled for the fourth quarter of
2020, is titled the ``Light of Internet'' Expo.\244\ The press
release announcing the conference says it is ``expected to be a
grand event for showcasing the latest technologies, products
and applications around the world.''\245\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\244\ World Internet Conference, ``Fore-Notice on The Light of
Internet Expo in the 7th World Internet Conference,'' Apr. 08 2020,
http://www.wuzhenwic.org/2020-04/08/c--469136.htm.
\245\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Standards-Setting Bodies
Another realm that China seeks to influence, along with the
major multilateral institutions, is global ICT standards-
setting bodies. Global ICT rules of the road are set by several
organizations, one of which is the 3rd Generation Partnership
Project (3GPP), a private sector partnership composed of seven
telecommunications standards development organizations.\246\
3GPP examines the range of technologies that make up mobile
telecommunications, including radio access, core networks,
cellular technologies, and services.\247\ According to the
U.S.-China Commission, ``[t]he number of Chinese
representatives serving in chair or vice chair leadership
positions [in the 3GPP] rose from 9 of the 53 available
positions in December 2012 to 11 of the 58 available positions
in December 2017.''\248\ Due to this prominence in the
organization's leadership, China has the capacity to influence
the 3GPP to its advantage.\249\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\246\ 3GPP, ``About 3GPP,'' https://www.3gpp.org/about-3gpp (last
visited July 6, 2020).
\247\ Id.
\248\ U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, 2018
Annual Report to Congress, at 455 (Nov. 2018).
\249\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another entity heavily influenced by the Chinese is the
International Telecommunications Union (ITU). According to its
website, ITU ``help[s] shape the future ICT policy and
regulatory environment, global standards, and best practices to
help spread access to ICT services.''\250\ Since 2014, the
Secretary-General of the ITU has been Houlin Zhao, a former
delegate at the Designing Institute of the Ministry of Posts
and Telecommunications of China.\251\ In addition to a former
Chinese official being at the head of the ITU, Chinese firms
and government research institutes held the largest number of
chair and vice chair positions in the ITU's 5G-related
standards-setting bodies, with eight of the 39 available
leadership positions as of September 2018.\252\ According to
Michael O'Rielly of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission,
the Chinese ``have loaded up the voting to try to get their
particular candidates on board, and their particular
standards.''\253\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\250\ International Telecommunication Union, ``About International
Telecommunication Union (ITU),'' Feb. 19, 2020, https://www.itu.int/en/
about/Pages/default.aspx.
\251\ International Telecommunications Union, ``Biography--Houlin
Zhao,'' (last visited July 6, 2020), https://www.itu.int/en/osg/Pages/
biography-zhao.aspx.
\252\ U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, 2018
Annual Report to Congress, at 454 (Nov. 2018).
\253\ Todd Shields & Alyza Sebenius, ``Huawei's Clout Is So Strong
It's Helping Shape Global 5G Rules,'' Bloomberg, Feb. 1, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Furthermore, it appears that as the head of the ITU,
Secretary-General Zhao has used his position to strengthen
China's digital influence around the world. The ITU-China
agreement on aiding countries with communications networks
resulted in ITU-China specific projects such as research and
training centers for ICT in Afghanistan, a Trans-Eurasian
Information Superhighway, and research and construction
projects in Africa.\254\ Secretary-General Zhao told China
Daily that it is ``highly likely'' that he would sign another
deal with the Export-Import Bank of China, and that working
with China is critical for the ITU.\255\ Finally, he added that
China's Belt and Road is the perfect platform ``to deliver
services and help with ICT development around the globe by
cooperating with China through the Initiative.''\256\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\254\ Kong Wenzheng, ``ITU Vows to Join Hands with China,'' China
Daily, May 24, 2019, www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201904/24/
WS5cbfbb1aa3104842260b7f2f.html.
\255\ Id.
\256\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Zhao Yonghong, Director-General of the Department of
International Cooperation in the Ministry of Industry and
Information Technology of the People's Republic of China,
offered additional context on China's role in the ITU in
September 2018. Zhao stated that the ITU should focus on
``[s]trengthen[ing] the leading role of ITU in ICT technical
standardization and further enhanc[ing] its influence in the
field of global standardization of emerging ICT
technologies.''\257\ In fact, in 2012, China--along with other
authoritarian regimes, like Russia and Saudi Arabia--introduced
a proposal at the World Conference on International
Telecommunications making ITU jurisdiction over the Internet
more powerful.\258\ Given China's leadership at the ITU, this
proposal could strengthen China's control of the Internet.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\257\ ``Top Contributors: Why China Supports ITU,'' ITU News, Sept.
20 2018, news.itu.int/top-contributors-why-china-supports-itu/.
\258\ Chris Welch, ``Russia, China, and Other Nations Draft
Proposal to Give ITU Greater Influence Over the Internet,'' The Verge,
Dec. 9 2012; Adi Robertson, ``New World Order: is the UN about to take
control of the internet?,'' The Verge, Nov. 29, 2012.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
China's strategy of using multilateral institutions to its
advantage appears to have paid off at the ITU. Evidence of this
success includes not only Zhao's support of Huawei, which in
2019 he defended against the United States' 5G security
concerns by calling them driven by politics rather than
evidence, but also China's ushering in of the proposed ``New
Internet Protocol'' (New IP).\259\ Some nations, including the
United Kingdom, Sweden, and the United States, have raised
concerns that China's New IP plan, if enacted, would fracture
the global Internet and give state-run Internet Service
Providers too much control.\260\ The Financial Times reports
that Huawei and other co-developers of New IP plan to promote
the proposal at an ITU telecommunication conference in India in
November 2020.\261\ Zhao, as the head of the ITU, could
influence whether the New IP is ratified.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\259\ Tom Miles, ``Huawei Allegations Driven by Politics Not
Evidence: U.N. Telecoms Chief,'' Reuters, Apr. 5 2019; Anna Gross &
Madhumita Murgia, ``China and Huawei Propose Reinvention of the
Internet,'' Financial Times, Mar. 27 2020.
\260\ Anna Gross & Madhumita Murgia, ``China and Huawei Propose
Reinvention of the Internet,'' Financial Times, Mar. 27 2020.
\261\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
However, there does appear to be some hope for democracies
in the global battleground over control of international
standards-setting bodies. In March 2020, the World Intellectual
Property Organization--the United Nations organization created
to lead the development of a balanced and effective
international IP system--announced that Daren Tang, a Singapore
national, won the nomination to become the new Director
General.\262\ Tang, who had the backing of the United States,
was congratulated upon his election by Secretary Pompeo, who
described him as ``an effective advocate for protecting
intellectual property [and] a vocal proponent of transparency
and institutional integrity.''\263\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\262\ Nick Cummings-Bruce, ``U.S.-Backed Candidate for Global Tech
Post Beats China's Nominee,'' The New York Times, Mar. 4, 2020. See
also The World Intellectual Property Organization, ``What Is WIPO?''
www.wipo.int/about-wipo/en/ (Last Visited May 21, 2020).
\263\ Press Statement, U.S. Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo,
``Election of Daren Tang of Singapore as Director General of the World
Intellectual Property Organization,'' Mar. 4 2020; Nick Cummings-Bruce,
``U.S.-Backed Candidate for Global Tech Post Beats China's Nominee,''
The New York Times, Mar. 4, 2020.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The contest between Tang and his main opponent, the China-
backed candidate Wang Binying, was a battle in the global
digital arena between the United States and China.\264\ In this
case, and in what many hope will be an indication of future
outcomes in the global competition between freedom and
surveillance, the ideals of transparency and international
cooperation won the day.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\264\ Nick Cumming-Bruce, ``U.S.-Backed Candidate for Global Tech
Post Beats China's Nominee,'' The New York Times, Mar. 4. 2020.
Chapter 4: Conclusions and Recommendations
----------
China's new model of digital authoritarianism, its
international efforts to assert economic dominance in the
digital domain, and its promotion of the adoption of a Chinese-
inspired model of digital governance abroad, show its desire to
alter and control the future of the digital domain. As
described in Chapter 1, China is altering and controlling the
digital domain domestically. It has developed and employed
emerging technologies and techniques, ranging from blocking
online content to utilizing facial recognition technologies
that strengthen its surveillance systems, in order to suppress
populations, individuals, and entities not aligned with the
Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
While the CCP's use of the digital domain to maintain
social control is problematic for those suffering in China,
China's growing digital influence on the global stage creates a
broader problem for the international community as China
proliferates its technologies at a rapid rate around the globe,
and in countries that span the spectrum of governance. As shown
in Chapter 2, even countries that are staunch U.S. allies and
stand for similar democratic and human rights values are
entertaining the integration of Chinese technologies into their
own digital infrastructures, such as 5G telecommunications, due
to low costs, lack of viable alternatives, uncertainty about
the future direction of the United States, and China's robust
economic and diplomatic efforts.\265\ As demonstrated in
Chapter 3, China is leveraging its newfound influence to shape
the rules of the road for the digital domain in ways that cater
to digital authoritarianism and is antithetical to the United
States' vision of how the Internet and cyber-enabled
technologies should be used.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\265\ Heather Stewart & Dan Sabbagh, ``UK Huawei Decision Appears
to Avert Row with US,'' The Guardian, Jan. 28, 2020.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Indeed, three and a half years into the Trump
administration, the United States is now on the precipice of
losing the future of the cyber domain to China. If China
continues to perfect the tools of digital authoritarianism and
is able to effectively implement them both domestically and
abroad, then China, not the United States and its allies, will
shape the digital environment in which most of the world
operates. Additionally, if the United States continues to cede
its traditional role of diplomatic and technological
leadership, the global growth of China's digital
authoritarianism model presents a sinister future for the
digital domain. At the grand strategic scale, if digital
authoritarianism flourishes, China's importance on both the
digital and global stages will continue to grow, allowing China
to surpass the United States in the digital space and
empowering China to create the future rules for digital
governance.\266\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\266\ See, e.g., John Chen et al., China's Internet of Things,
Research Report Prepared on Behalf of the U.S.-China Economic and
Security Review Commission, by SOS International (SOSi), at 69 (Oct.
2018).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The spread of digital authoritarianism may also affect the
United States' relationships with other countries as they
determine how to balance their relationships with China,
especially in the face of growing pressure to mirror China's
authoritarian behavior in the digital domain. Furthermore, the
basic human rights of individuals around the world, including
U.S. citizens, could be negatively affected by a cyber domain
that is reliant on Chinese technologies and values. As seen in
places such as Xinjiang, personal privacy and civil liberties
are threatened by China's digital authoritarianism model.\267\
The global proliferation of China's digital authoritarianism
model, if unchecked, will see even more individuals fall under
the control of authoritarians who use these technologies and
techniques.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\267\ See, e.g., Lindsay Maizland, ``China's Repression of Uighurs
in Xinjiang,'' Council on Foreign Relations, updated June 30, 2020,
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-repression-uighurs-xinjiang;
U.S. Department of State, 2018 Report on International Religious
Freedom: China: Xinjiang, May 23, 2019, available at https://
www.state.gov/reports/2018-report-on-international-religious-freedom/
china-includes-tibet-xinjiang-hong-kong-and-macau/xinjiang/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Despite China's various gains within the digital domain,
such as its emerging technical capabilities and growing
economic strength, there is still significant opportunity for
the United States to adopt a genuinely competitive strategy and
approach to China, to remain the global leader on cyberspace
governance, and to reassert its leadership in areas where the
technological gap between the United States and China has
shrunk or disappeared. Accomplishing these goals will mark an
important step in competing with China's digital
authoritarianism, as opposed to merely denouncing it. Achieving
the goal of securing a free digital domain and mitigating the
threat of digital authoritarianism, however, will require a
whole-of-government approach that leverages all aspects of the
U.S. government, the private sector, and, critically, genuine
partnerships with our partners and allies on the world stage.
The Administration's current policy, which is detailed in Annex
1 of this report, is insufficient to combat China's digital
authoritarianism, and its alienation of allies has further
stunted the United States' ability to influence other countries
away from China's digital authoritarianism model.
=======================================================================
Recommendations
This report offers the following recommendations for more
effective U.S. action to counter China's digital
authoritarianism.
Develop and Deploy Alternatives to Chinese 5G Technology with
U.S. Allies: The United States lags behind China in
developing and deploying cutting-edge 5G technologies,
both domestically and abroad.\268\ To provide an
alternative, the U.S. should:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\268\ Stu Woo, ``In the Race to Dominate 5G, China Sprints Ahead,''
The Wall Street Journal, Sept. 7, 2019.
Establish a Federally Funded Research and Development
Center (FFRDC) on 5G: Congress should pass legislation
to establish an FFRDC that will examine how the United
States can surpass China in the 5G development space.
The FFRDC should examine U.S. technological strengths
and weaknesses, as well as areas for immediate
telecommunications development to provide an
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
alternative to Chinese platforms and technologies.
Create an Industry Consortium on 5G: Congress should create
a consortium comprised of leading U.S.
telecommunications and technology companies that would
be mandated to create the American 5G
telecommunications alternative, exploring both cost-
effective hardware and software solutions.
Invest in Radio Access Network (RAN) Technologies: Congress
should provide new appropriations for RAN
technologies.\269\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\269\ ``What are Radio Access Networks and 5G RAN?,'' Verizon, Feb.
2, 2020, https://www.verizon.com/about/our-company/5g/5g-radio-access-
networks (last visited July 10, 2020). According to Verizon, ``[c]ell
phones use radio waves to communicate by converting your voice and data
into digital signals to send through as radio waves. In order for your
cell phone to connect to a network or the internet, it connects first
through a radio access network (RAN). Radio access networks utilize
radio transceivers to connect you to the cloud. Most base stations (aka
transceivers) are primarily connected via fiber backhaul to the mobile
core network.'' Id.
Establish a 5G Policy Coordinator within the White House:
The President should establish the position of a 5G
Policy Coordinator tasked with coordinating the U.S.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
government's domestic and international 5G strategy.
Limit the Spread of Malign Chinese Surveillance Technologies
and Digital Authori-tarianism: China is a leading
developer and exporter of surveillance technologies,
and continues to integrate new technologies that
provide increasingly intrusive surveillance
capabilities that can be misused by China or other
state actors.
Establish a Digital Rights Promotion Fund: Congress should
establish and authorize a Digital Rights Promotion
Fund, which will provide grants and investments
directly to entities that support the promotion of a
free, secure, stable, and open digital domain and fight
against the authoritarian use of information and
communications technologies. The fund will provide
these groups, especially those existing in countries
experiencing undue surveillance or other forms of
digital authoritarianism, the resources needed to
better push back against the spread of digital
authoritarianism. Groups able to receive money would
include:
Local activist organizations promoting a free
digital domain and working to counter oppressive
surveillance regimes in countries where digital
authoritarianism is apparent or on the rise.
Nonprofit organizations that advocate for the
adoption of international governance standards for
the digital domain based on openness, transparency,
and the rule of law, including the protection of
human rights.
Think tanks and other institutional bodies
that provide scholarship and policy recommendations
for best paths forward to protect against the rise
of authoritarian surveillance.
Establish an International Digital Infrastructure
Corporation: Congress should establish an independent,
non-profit corporation with a clear and specific
mandate to provide foreign countries with low-interest
loans, grants, and other financing opportunities to
purchase and implement U.S.-made digital
infrastructure.
Authorize the Open Technology Fund: Congress should fully
authorize funds for the Open Technology Fund by passing
S. 3820, the Open Technology Fund Authorization Act
sponsored by Senators Robert Menendez, Marsha
Blackburn, Ron Wyden, and Rick Scott.
Strengthen the U.S. Digital Workforce: In order to compete
and lead the digital space in the future, the United
States will need an adaptable, innovative, and capable
cyber workforce.
Establish a Cyber Service Academy: Through legislative
action, Congress should establish a new federal service
academy similar to our other military service
academies, with the specific aim of developing the
future of our technology force. In addition to
providing students a four year undergraduate education,
the academy shall prepare students to become future
military leaders in key digital and emerging technology
fields, including robotics, artificial intelligence
(AI), and cybersecurity.
Boost funding for STEM programs: Congress should
significantly increase federal spending on STEM
programs, including Department of Defense (DoD) funding
in the National Defense Education program, funding for
the National Science Foundation, and funding for the
Minority Science and Engineering Improvement program
within the Department of Education.
Reinvigorate U.S. Diplomatic Leadership and Alliances, and
Take a More Robust Role on the International Stage:
China has made a concerted effort to change norms and
practices to strengthen its position in various
international fora regarding the digital domain.\270\
China has additionally pushed economic development
relating to technology in critical regions throughout
the world.\271\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\270\ John Chen et al., China's Internet of Things, Research Report
Prepared on Behalf of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review
Commission, by SOS International (SOSi), at 69 (Oct. 2018).
\271\ Id.
Build a Coalition of Likeminded Allies on Critical
Technology Issues: The President should lead an
international effort, in coordination with our allies
and partners, to counter Chinese efforts to develop and
proliferate digital domain products, technologies, and
services that are not predicated on free, democratic
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
values.
Establish Mutual Cyber Defense Agreements: The United
States should approach likeminded nations to develop
and establish mutual cyber defense and cooperation
agreements that ensure national critical
infrastructure, secure communications, trade
relationships, and civil liberties are protected
against cyber-attacks.
Reassert U.S. Leadership in International Fora: The
President should establish a strategy for ensuring the
United States holds chairmanships, serves as a leading
voice, and operates as a key player in international
fora such as the International Telecommunications Union
or UN Group of Governmental Experts.
Establish and Empower New Cyber Leadership within the State
Department: Congress should pass the Cyber Diplomacy
Act of 2019, or similar legislation, that establishes a
new office or bureau of cyber issues at the State
Department, which shall report to the Under Secretary
for Political Affairs.
=======================================================================
Annex 1: Understanding the Trump
Cyberspace Policy
----------
The United States is at a crossroads in regards to
countering the implementation and growth of digital
authoritarianism led by the regime in China. China's efforts to
bring about the rise of digital authoritarianism hold the
potential to fundamentally alter the landscape of information
and communications technologies, as well as the legal and
institutional underpinnings of these digital technologies, in
ways that are incongruent with U.S. values and detrimental to
U.S. and allied economic and security interests. Issues ranging
from Chinese domination of the global information
infrastructure and taking advantage of communications
vulnerabilities, to using new technologies to assault basic
human rights, to inhibiting U.S. economic and business
opportunities abroad because of unreliable and exposed digital
networks are all on the table if digital authoritarianism
continues to proliferate unfettered.
It is imperative for the United States to perform its role
as the leading force in developing, sustaining, and
promulgating a global digital order based on openness,
transparency, and the rule of law, including the protection of
human rights. If the United States and other democratic
countries are unable or unwilling to work to reverse the
concerning trend of China's rising digital authoritarianism, we
will cede the future of the global digital order to China and
other authoritarian regimes. This annex examines President
Trump and his Administration's efforts and policies, as well as
recent Congressional actions, regarding cyberspace and whether
these actions effectively curb China's digital
authoritarianism.
National Security Policy Documents
In September 2018, the Trump administration released its
National Cyber Strategy (NCS). As a foundational policy
document for the Administration, the NCS sets the stage for how
the United States views the current climate within the cyber
domain and how, broadly, they tackle issues that arise. The
Trump administration frames the cyber domain as one where the
United States is ``in a continuous competition against
strategic adversaries, rogue states, and terrorist and criminal
networks.''\272\ Such a characterization builds upon the
labeling in the Trump administration's National Security
Strategy (NSS), which describes China's exploitation of data
and its alleged attempts to spread features of its
authoritarian system, including corruption and the use of
surveillance technology.\273\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\272\ President Donald J. Trump, National Cyber Strategy of the
United States of America, The White House, Sept. 2018, at 2.
\273\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
By framing China and the cyber domain this way, the Trump
administration fits the issues contained in cyberspace within
one of the principal characteristics of its national security
strategy: that the United States is in a great-power
competition with key adversaries. The NCS proceeds to
specifically label China as one of the entities that is
challenging the United States within the cyber domain.\274\
While the document falls short of directly identifying the
Chinese Communist Party's use of digital authoritarianism as a
national security threat, the NCS articulates a need to defend
against authoritarian states utilizing security or terrorism
concerns to erode a free and secure Internet.\275\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\274\ President Donald J. Trump, National Cyber Strategy of the
United States of America, The White House, Sept. 2018, at 2.
\275\ Id., at 24.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The NCS breaks U.S. cyber strategy into four pillars. These
pillars are:
1. Protect the American People, the Homeland, and the American
Way of Life--involving issues such as protecting U.S.
networks, critical infrastructure, and data, combatting
crime, and pushing government innovation;
2. Promote American Prosperity--including promoting America's
advantage in the digital economy, maintaining U.S.
leadership on cyber issues, and strengthening the U.S.
workforce;
3. Preserve Peace through Strength--featuring deterring malign
cyber activities and enhancing norms of state behavior;
4. Advance American Influence--containing extending a free and
interoperable Internet globally and building
international cyber capacity.\276\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\276\ President Donald J. Trump, National Cyber Strategy of the
United States of America, The White House, Sept. 2018, at 6, 8, 10, 14,
16, 17, 20, 21, 24, 25, and 26; Congressional Research Service,
Research Conducted for Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019.
From these four platforms flow priority actions meant to
target certain issues, ranging from building a proposed cyber
deterrence initiative, to ``promot[ing] and maintain[ing]
markets for United States ingenuity worldwide,'' to maintaining
United States leadership in emerging technologies.\277\ Due to
China's continued growth within the cyber domain, many of these
priority actions in effect target digital authoritarianism in
some way. For example, the NCS outlines a need to broadly
engage global partners, international organizations, and civil
society to protect Internet freedom and improve international
cyber capacity.\278\ Critical to this effort is the need for
the U.S. to reinforce the openness, interoperability, and
reliability of the Internet.\279\ The plan calls for investment
in the communications infrastructure and cybersecurity
capacities of partner states to not only enhance the Cyber
Deterrence Initiative, but also to ensure their Internet
capabilities align with U.S. interests and standards of
Internet freedom.\280\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\277\ President Donald J. Trump, National Cyber Strategy of the
United States of America, The White House, Sept. 2018, at 15, 21, 25.
\278\ Id., at 25 and 26. According the National Cyber Strategy,
cyber capacity building involves ``the United States build[ing]
strategic partnerships that promote cybersecurity best practices
through a common vision of an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure
Internet that encourages investment and opens new economic markets. In
addition, capacity building allows for additional opportunities to
share cyber threat information, enabling the United States Government
and our partners to better defend domestic critical infrastructure and
global supply chains, as well as focus whole-of government cyber
engagements.'' Id.
\279\ Id., at 24.
\280\ Id., at 21 and 26. Espoused in the Administration's 2018
National Cyber Strategy, the Cyber Deterrence Initiative is an effort
``to build such a coalition and develop tailored strategies to ensure
adversaries understand the consequences of their malicious cyber
behavior.'' To achieve this goal, ``the United States will work with
like-minded states to coordinate and support each other's responses to
significant malicious cyber incidents, including through intelligence
sharing, buttressing of attribution claims, public statements of
support for responsive actions taken, and joint imposition of
consequences against malign actors.'' Id. at 21.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are other mechanisms espoused in the NCS that could
play a role in combatting China's digital authoritarianism that
are not explicitly linked to the topic. One such example is how
a primary objective of ``promoting American prosperity'' in the
NCS is to ``preserve U.S. influence in the technological
ecosystem and the development of cyberspace as an open engine
of economic growth, innovation, and efficiency.''\281\ The
purpose of this objective is to ``foster a vibrant and
resilient digital economy'' through prioritizing innovation and
maintaining U.S. leadership in emerging technologies.\282\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\281\ Id., at 14.
\282\ Id., at 14-15; Congressional Research Service, Research
Conducted for Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another key issue put forth by the NCS to help the United
States better compete in the digital marketplace and fight back
against digital authoritarianism is strengthening its
leadership on innovation and developing emerging
technologies.\283\ One of the primary aspects for driving U.S.
technological development leadership is to promote the free
flow of data across borders that push against authoritarian
governments' attempts to localize data under the guise of
national security, and, along that vein, the NCS asserts that
the Administration will promote ``open, industry driven
standards, innovative products, and approaches that permit
global innovation and the free flow of data while meeting the
legitimate security needs of the U.S.''\284\ Additionally, the
NCS aims to ensure the United States counters behavior that
acts against U.S. interests, saying in its third pillar that
the administration would use ``all appropriate tools of
national power to expose and counter the flood of online malign
influence and information campaigns and non-state propaganda
and disinformation.''\285\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\283\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019.
\284\ Id.; President Donald J. Trump, National Cyber Strategy of
the United States of America, The White House, Sept. 2018, at 14.
\285\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019; President Donald J. Trump, National
Cyber Strategy of the United States of America, The White House, Sept.
2018, at 21.
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Administration Efforts
China continues to rapidly expand its digital
authoritarianism model and make gains on the United States in
becoming the dominant player on a range of critical
technologies, placing U.S. leadership on cyber issues at risk.
In response to the gains in Chinese technological development,
the Trump administration has turned to punitive measures, using
sanctions as a weapon against China. As China's technology
sector begins to achieve global significance, several of its
players have found themselves on the front lines of the U.S.-
China trade war and atop U.S. sanctions lists.\286\ Most
notably, one of China's largest companies, Huawei, has been the
target of U.S. sanctions and restrictions as the U.S. seeks to
pre-empt potential cyber threats.\287\ The Trump administration
has referred to Huawei as a national security threat, cited the
telecommunications giant's close ties to the Chinese
government, its repeated intellectual property theft, and its
violations of U.S. sanctions on Iran as reasons for Huawei to
be excluded from U.S. markets, and encouraged others to take
similar steps.\288\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\286\ Kiran Stacey et al., ``US blacklists 28 Chinese entities in
trade war escalation,'' Financial Times, October 8, 2019; Ana Swanson,
``U.S. Delivers Another Blow to Huawei With New Tech Restrictions,''
The New York Times, May 15, 2020.
\287\ Ana Swanson, ``U.S. Delivers Another Blow to Huawei With New
Tech Restrictions,'' The New York Times, May 15, 2020; Associated
Press, ``US Adds New Sanction on Chinese Tech Giant Huawei,'' US News
and World Report, May 16, 2020.
\288\ Ana Swanson, ``U.S. Delivers Another Blow to Huawei With New
Tech Restrictions,'' The New York Times, May 15, 2020; David Goldman,
``What Did Huawei do to Land in Such Hot Water with the US?'' CNN, May
20, 2019; Federal Communications Commission, ``FCC Bars Use of
Universal Service Funding for Equipment and Services Posing National
Security Risks,'' Nov. 22, 2019; Protecting Against National Security
Threats to the Communications Supply Chain Through FCC Programs; Huawei
Designation; ZTE Designation, 85 Fed. Reg. 27610, Jan. 3, 2020; Dan
Strumpf & Patricia Kowsmann, ``U.S. Prosecutors Probe Huawei on New
Allegations of Technology Theft,'' The Wall Street Journal, Aug. 29,
2019; Julian E. Barnes and Adam Satariano, ``U.S. Campaign to Ban
Huawei Overseas Stumbles as Allies Resist,'' The New York Times, Mar.
17, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Although U.S. suspicions of Huawei can be traced as far
back as 2012, recent actions are supposedly meant to
demonstrate a more aggressive U.S. posture towards the company
and the Chinese technology sector as a whole.\289\ In May 2018,
the Pentagon banned the sale of Huawei and ZTE phones on U.S.
military bases.\290\ Later that year, Huawei's CFO (and
daughter of its founder), Meng Wanzhou, was arrested in Canada
at the United States' request for allegedly violating U.S.
sanctions on Iran.\291\ On May 15, 2019, President Trump issued
Executive Order 13873 on Securing the Information and
Communications Technology and Services Supply Chain, which
declared:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\289\ Sean Keane, ``Huawei ban timeline: Uber rival hits AppGallery
store as it moves towards self-sufficiency,'' CNET, June 25, 2020; Pam
Benson, ``Congressional report: U.S. should 'view with suspicion' two
Chinese companies,'' CNN, Oct. 8, 2012.
\290\ Sean Keane, ``Huawei ban timeline: Uber rival hits AppGallery
store as it moves towards self-sufficiency,'' CNET, June 25, 2020;
Katie Collins, ``Pentagon bans sale of Huawei, ZTE phones on US
military bases,'' CNET, May 2, 2018.
\291\ Press Release, U.S. Department of Justice, ``Chinese
Telecommunications Conglomerate Huawei and Huawei CFO Wanzhou Meng
Charged with Financial Fraud,'' January 28, 2019; Dan Bilefsky,
``Extradition Hearings Begin for Meng Wanzhou, Huawei Officer Held in
Canada,'' The New York Times, Jan. 20, 2020.
The threat of foreign adversaries to U.S. ICT
technologies--through creating and exploiting
vulnerabilities in technology and services, and ``the
unrestricted acquisition or use in the United States of
information and communications technology or services,
designed, developed, manufactured, or supplied by
persons owned by, controlled by, or subject to the
jurisdiction or direction of foreign adversaries''--
constitutes an ``unusual and extraordinary threat to
the national security, foreign policy, and economy of
the United States.''\292\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\292\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019; President Donald J. Trump, Executive
Order on Securing the Information and Communications Technology and
Services Supply Chain, The White House, May 15, 2018; U.S. Department
of Commerce--Securing the Information and Communications Technology and
Services Supply Chain, 84 Fed. Reg. 65316, Nov. 27, 2019.
Following the Executive Order issuance, the United States
in May 2019 placed Huawei and 68 of its affiliates on the
Bureau of Industry and Security's Entity List via authorities
in the Export Control Reform Act of 2018's Export
Administration Regulations, and subsequently in August added 46
additional entities, in an effort to restrict their access to
U.S. markets.\293\ In May 2020, the administration unveiled new
rules requiring foreign semiconductor makers to obtain a U.S.
license to ship Huawei-designed semiconductors produced using
U.S. technology to Huawei.\294\ More broadly, the United States
has sought to mount pressure on allies and partners such as
Germany and the UK to restrict Huawei equipment in their 5G
infrastructure plans due to security concerns.\295\ These
efforts, however, have produced mixed results at best, and may
well have been counterproductive, at least in the short-term,
as seen in Chapter 2 of this report.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\293\ Addition of Certain Entities to the Entity List and Revision
of Entries on the Entity List, 84 Fed. Reg. 43493, Aug. 21, 2019;
Addition of Entities to the Entity List, 84 Fed. Reg. 22961, May 21,
2019.
\294\ Frank Bajak, ``US adds new sanction on Chinese tech giant
Huawei,'' Associated Press, May 16, 2020.
\295\ Julian E. Barnes & Adam Satariano, ``U.S. Campaign to Ban
Huawei Overseas Stumbles as Allies Resist,'' The New York Times, March
17, 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortunately, contradictory U.S. policy implementation has
hampered the impact of punitive measures to change China's
behavior. This contradiction can be seen in the Commerce
Department's provision of temporary licenses to Huawei despite
the administration's stated need and previous actions for
increasing scrutiny of Huawei transactions.\296\ The Commerce
Department unveiled that the:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\296\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019; Addition of Entities to the Entity
List, 84 Fed. Reg. 22961, May 21, 2019.
Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) issued a 90-day
Temporary General License to allow for the completion
by August 19th of contracts entered into before May
16th. On August 15th, BIS issued an additional General
License to allow for some engagement with Huawei and
its affiliates to continue.\297\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\297\ Congressional Research Service, Research Conducted for
Committee Staff, Sept. 30, 2019; Temporary General License: Extension
of Validity, Clarifications to Authorized Transactions, and Changes to
Certification Statement Requirements, 84 Fed. Reg. 43487, August 21,
2019; Addition of Certain Entities to the Entity List and Revision of
Entries on the Entity List, 84 Fed. Reg. 43493, Aug. 21, 2019.
While a variety of factors enter into how BIS decides
whether a company should receive certain export or transfer
waivers, the provision of multiple waivers to Huawei and other
entities fundamentally conflicts with the Administration's
stated desire to mitigate the risks associated with increased
proliferation of Huawei technologies. Consequently, episodes
such as this one highlight how the Administration's policy and
actions are not in sync, damaging the United States' ability to
push back on essential levers of China's digital
authoritarianism system.
For its part, Huawei has loudly decried U.S. actions taken
against the company, through both legal challenges and public
statements. For example, the company filed a suit against the
FCC for a ruling in November 2019 blocking the use of federal
funds to purchase Huawei products, saying ``it fails to offer
Huawei required due process protections.''\298\ The company has
questioned the United States' motives for targeting Huawei,
asserting that the United States ``is leveraging its own
technological strengths to crush companies outside its own
borders. This will only serve to undermine the trust
international companies place in US technology and supply
chains.''\299\ Huawei has even accused the U.S. of illegal
behavior such as hacking its systems and threatening its
employees.\300\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\298\ Norman Pearlstine et al., ``The War Against Huawei,'' Los
Angeles Times, Dec. 19, 2019; Colin Lecher, ``The FCC votes to block
Huawei from billions in federal aid,'' The Verge, Nov. 22, 2019.
\299\ Eileen Yu, ``Huawei rebukes US attempts to stymie foreign
competition with chip rule,'' ZDNet, May 18, 2020.
\300\ Dan Strumpf & Chuin-Wei Yap, ``Huawei Accuses the U.S. of
Cyberattacks and Staff Threats,'' The Wall Street Journal, Sept. 3,
2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In response to the growing threats posed by digital
authoritarianism, the federal government has taken steps
towards improving U.S. cybersecurity capabilities. In 2018,
President Trump signed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure
Security Agency Act into law, establishing the Cybersecurity
and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) within the Department
of Homeland Security (DHS).\301\ CISA's mission is to ``lead
the National effort to understand and manage cyber and physical
risk to our critical infrastructure.\302\ The agency's
formation is a step toward securing U.S. domestic cyber
infrastructure; however, as an agency within DHS, its mandate
does not extend into the international realm, and therefore is
unlikely to be able to play a role in pushing back against
China's spread of digital authoritarianism around the globe.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\301\ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, ``About
CISA,'' https://www.cisa.gov/about-cisa (last visited May 10, 2020).
\302\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The State Department, which oversees international
diplomatic efforts regarding the cyber domain, does not
currently have the structure needed to effectively tackle
China's growing influence in the digital sphere. In 2018, the
State Department released proposals to establish a Bureau of
Cyberspace Security and Emerging Technologies (CSET), which
would consolidate and strengthen U.S. diplomatic efforts to
secure cyberspace and digitally enabled technologies, reduce
risks of cyber conflict, and boost America's cyber
competitiveness.\303\ In the proposal, the Bureau would operate
under the office of the Under Secretary for Arms Control and
International Security Affairs.\304\ However, the rollout was
stalled in Congress due to negotiations over the bureau's
placement and a lack of clarity over its mandate.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\303\ Sean Lyngaas, ``State Department Proposes New $20.8 million
Cybersecurity Bureau,'' Cyberscoop, June 5, 2019, https://
www.cyberscoop.com/state-department-proposes-new-20-8-million-
cybersecurity-bureau/.
\304\ U.S. Department of State, Congressional Budget Justification
Appendix 1: Department of State Diplomatic Engagement, Fiscal Year
2021.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
One alternative to CSET--the Cyber Diplomacy Act of 2019--
was introduced in Congress by Representatives McCaul (R-TX-10)
and Engel (D-NY-16) in January 2019.\305\ The Cyber Diplomacy
Act would create an Office of International Cyberspace Policy
(OICP), operating under the State Department's Under Secretary
of Political Affairs. In addition to advising the State
Department on cyberspace policy, the office would engage in
diplomatic efforts to reinforce international cybersecurity,
promote Internet access and freedom, and counter international
cyber threats. The bill directly calls out China for promoting
international norms of Internet behavior that restrict critical
freedoms. In addition, the bill requires the OICP to produce
annual country reports on human rights practices relating to
the Internet, particularly emphasizing online censorship and
political repression.\306\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\305\ Cyber Diplomacy Act of 2019, H.R. 739 (116th Congress,
introduced Jan. 24, 2019).
\306\ Id.
Annex 2: The United States and 5G
----------
One of the most prominent and pressing issues facing the
United States regarding the future of the digital domain is the
development and deployment of 5G telecommunications
technologies. 5G technologies, following on fourth generation
(4G) and LTE technologies, provide a number of improvements to
the capabilities of previous generations, including increased
data transfer rates in a fixed period of time, also known as
bandwidth, and enhanced connectivity capabilities, such as
ultra-low latency (the delay between when data is sent from one
device on a network and received by another).\307\ 5G
technologies are deployed in new ways compared to their
predecessors: while previous generations used large cell towers
to transmit signals, 5G can also use small cells (radio access
points) that are about the size of a picnic cooler or mini
fridge, creating greater cellular density and faster
deployment.\308\ 5G networks are also critical to enabling the
proliferation of the Internet of Things (IoT) devices.\309\
Such enhanced capabilities will not only reshape cellular
communications and facilitate the development of emerging
technologies, but will also fundamentally alter how industries
and societies that rely on connectivity to data sources
operate.\310\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\307\ Qualcomm, ``Everything You Need to Know about 5G,'' https://
www.qualcomm.com/invention/5g/what-is-5g (last visited May 13, 2020);
Congressional Research Service, Fifth Generation (5G)
Telecommunications Technologies: Issues for Congress, Jan. 30, 2019, at
1.
\308\ ``What is Small Cell Technology?,'' Verizon, Aug. 8, 2018,
https://www.verizon.com/about/our-company/5g/what-small-cell-technology
(last visited May 14, 2020); ``Why 5G Can't Succeed Without a Small
Cell Revolution,'' PwC, https://www.pwc.com/us/en/industry/tmt/assets/
5g-small-cell-revolution.pdf (last visited May 13, 2020).
\309\ Murali Venkatesh, ``How 5G Networking Will Unleash the Full
Potential of IoT,'' Oracle, Feb. 4, 2019, https://blogs.oracle.com/iot/
how-5g-networking-will-unleash-the-full-potential-of-iot.
\310\ Dan Patterson & Anisha Nandi, ``5G explained: How it works,
who it will impact, and when we'll have it,'' CBS News, Feb. 21, 2019;
PwC, ``Why 5G Can't Succeed Without a Small Cell Revolution,'' https://
www.pwc.com/us/en/industry/tmt/assets/5g-small-cell-revolution.pdf
(last visited May 13, 2020).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While the spread of 5G technologies will provide many
positive impacts for society and industry, China is pursuing
avenues to manipulate the capabilities endowed by these new
technologies. As noted earlier in the report, China has made
significant inroads in the development and deployment of 5G.
China's efforts, as a number of former military leaders
elucidate in an April 3, 2019, letter, present ``grave
concerns'' to the United States, our allies, and our
partners.\311\ The letter states that a widely adopted Chinese-
developed 5G network ``provide[s] near-persistent data transfer
back to China,'' would mean U.S. reliance on Chinese
technologies for critical military communications, and will
``advance a pernicious high-tech authoritarianism.''\312\ These
comments underscore that a 5G infrastructure built on Chinese
technologies will promote digital authoritarianism around the
globe, and consequently, why the United States must pursue
mechanisms to mitigate China's influence in this digital
sphere.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\311\ Letter from Adm. James Stavridis et al., ``Statement by
Former U.S. Military Leaders,'' Apr. 3, 2019, https://
www.lawfareblog.com/document-former-military-and-intelligence-
officials-letter-5g-risks.
\312\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As 5G technology moves closer to global deployment, the
U.S. has some technological disadvantages that have both
commercial and security implications. The development of 5G
networks will boost the rate of implementation for new and
transformative technologies ranging from autonomous vehicles to
smart cities to virtual reality.\313\ There is much to gain
from leading the pack in the global telecommunications race--
and much to lose by lagging behind.\314\ Although Europe
dominated the development and implementation of 2G
technologies, and Japan led on the deployment and adoption of
3G technologies, beginning in about 2016 the United States
pulled ahead and led on the development and adoption of
4G.\315\ Through a first-mover advantage provided by its
innovation and implementation of 4G and LTE, and complemented
by its competitive mobile device technologies, the United
States was able to shape the global 4G ecosystem.\316\ U.S.
companies took advantage of the enhanced capabilities of the
new network, developing devices, apps, and services that would
dominate global markets.\317\ This success led to a 70% growth
of the U.S. telecommunications industry between 2011 and 2014,
increasing industry jobs by 80% and boosting GDP.\318\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\313\ Randal Kenworthy, ``The 5G and IoT Revolution is Coming:
Here's What to Expect,'' Forbes Technology Council, Nov. 18, 2019.
\314\ Statement of Peter Harrell, Center for a New American
Security, 5G: National Security Concerns, Intellectual Property Issues,
and the Impact on Competition and Innovation, Hearing before the United
States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, May 14, 2019, at 2, https://
s3.amazonaws.com/files.cnas.org/documents/Harrell-Judiciary-Testimony-
May-14-2019.pdf?mtime=20190515171307.
\315\ Recon Analytics, How America's Leading Position in 4G
Propelled the Economy, at 6 (Apr. 16, 2018), https://api.ctia.org/wp-
content/uploads/2018/04/Recon-Analytics--How-Americas-4G-Leadership-
Propelled-US-Economy--2018.pdf.
\316\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 6 (Apr. 2019).
\317\ Statement of Peter Harrell, Center for a New American
Security, 5G: National Security Concerns, Intellectual Property Issues,
and the Impact on Competition and Innovation, Hearing before the United
States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, May 14, 2019, at 2, https://
s3.amazonaws.com/files.cnas.org/documents/Harrell-Judiciary-Testimony-
May-14-2019.pdf?mtime=20190515171307.
\318\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 7 (Apr. 2019);
Recon Analytics, How America's Leading Position in 4G Propelled the
Economy, at 6 (Apr. 16, 2018).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Yet whatever advantages the U.S. had in the innovation
deployment of 4G and LTE networks are beginning to narrow in
the new age of wireless development. A 2019 report by the
Defense Innovation Board suggests that, due to several critical
shortcomings in U.S. 5G development, it is unlikely the US will
win the race to 5G.\319\ A critical differentiator between 4G
and 5G technologies is that 5G will leverage various segments
of the electromagnetic spectrum: from the low to mid-band
spectrum, or ``sub-6'', to the high-band spectrum, or
``mmWave.''\320\ As the spectrum bands are the fundamental
layers upon which the entire 5G network and infrastructure is
built, the decision to develop technologies based on lower or
higher frequencies is one of the most critical near-term
choices for policy-makers and involves different levels of
costs and investments.\321\ For example, mmWave technologies
are capable of faster and more secure data transmission, but
require far greater infrastructure and monetary investments to
set up, while the sub-6 band can cover broader areas with less
risk of interruption and is able to ``leverage existing 4G
infrastructure.''\322\ Currently, the advantages of the sub-6
band, especially on costs and broad coverage, make it the most
likely near-term outcome for propagating a 5G ecosystem.\323\
However, in the United States, portions of the sub-6 bands are
owned by the government, somewhat limiting civilian and
commercial use of that spectrum.\324\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\319\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 7 (Apr. 2019).
\320\ Id. at 8-11.
\321\ Dave Andersen, ``5G FAQ series: What's the difference between
mmWave and sub-6 GHz spectrum?,'' RootMetrics by IHS Markit, Oct. 28,
2019, https://rootmetrics.com/en-GB/content/5g-faq-series-whats-the-
difference-between-mmwave-and-sub-6-ghz-spectrum; Gabriel Brown, White
Paper: Exploring the Potential of mmWave for 5G Mobile Access, Heavy
Reading, at 3, 8, 10 (June 2016), https://www.qualcomm.com/media/
documents/files/heavy-reading-whitepaper-exploring-the-potential-of-
mmwave-for-5g-mobile-access.pdf.
\322\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 8, 10 (Apr. 2019).
\323\ Id., at 10; Dave Andersen, ``5G FAQ series: What's the
difference between mmWave and sub-6 GHz spectrum?,'' RootMetrics by IHS
Markit, Oct. 28, 2019, https://rootmetrics.com/en-GB/content/5g-faq-
series-whats-the-difference-between-mmwave-and-sub-6-ghz-spectrum
\324\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 10 (Apr. 2019). It
is important to note that while the government holds large portions of
the sub-6GHz spectrum, there have been certain initiatives aimed at
freeing up some of this spectrum, such as S. 19, the MOBILE Now Act
introduced by Senators John Thune (R-ND) and Bill Nelson (D-FL) during
the 115th Congress in 2018. Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The limits on spectrum have posed a number of problems to
US near-term competitiveness in the 5G global ecosystem, not
least of which is that Chinese companies have managed to
outpace the U.S. in development and export of its 5G
infrastructure. China has pursued infrastructure buildout based
on the sub-6 spectrum band, and with its head start in the
global deployment of its 5G infrastructure, has been able to
attract a growing share of the global market with its promises
of a high quality and low cost network.\325\ Given the current
higher costs and lower density of the mmWave spectrum range,
many global players--including key U.S. allies and partners--
have chosen to follow China's lead.\326\ The consequences of
China leading the buildout of the global 5G ecosystem are
severe, and could include creating overseas security risks for
Department of Defense operations and eroding competitive supply
chains for the United States.\327\ It is critically important
to note, however, that the United States could find a future
advantage by leading on mmWave technologies, since 1) this band
is the spectrum where ultra-fast innovations may arise and 2) a
fully actualized 5G network will see devices seamlessly utilize
and transition between both the sub-6 and mmWave bands.\328\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\325\ Id., at 12, 21; Press Release, U.S. Department of Justice,
``Attorney General William P. Barr Delivers the Keynote Address at the
Department of Justice's China Initiative Conference,'' February 6,
2020.
\326\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 15 (Apr. 2019).
\327\ Id. at 4.
\328\ Monica Alleven, ``SK Telecom, Ericsson demonstrate 5G
connected BMW at 28 GHz,'' Fierce Wireless, Nov. 15, 2016, https://
www.fiercewireless.com/tech/sk-telecom-ericsson-demonstrate-5g-
connected-bmw-at-28-ghz; Bevin Fletcher, ``New Samsung 5G phones can
tap both sub-6 GHz and millimeter wave spectrum,'' Fierce Wireless,
Feb. 12, 2020, https://www.fiercewireless.com/devices/new-samsung-5g-
phones-can-tap-both-sub-6-ghz-and-millimeter-wave-spectrum.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Another reason the United States finds itself in greater
competition with China on 5G deployment is that China has spent
more on 5G development, implementing 198,000 5G-operable base
stations domestically, with 500,000 more planned, and rapidly
deploying 5G equipment and infrastructure around the
world.\329\ In Europe in particular, Huawei and ZTE have
partnered with many countries to build their 5G networks
despite US protests over security concerns, and Chinese-built
network infrastructure continues to spread across the
continent.\330\ Within Congress and the Administration there is
a bipartisan understanding of the threats posed by Chinese
firms building the base layers of radio equipment and other
telecommunications infrastructure upon which 5G operates.
Unfortunately, there is a major gap in the United States
government between rhetorical complaints about Chinese efforts
to dominate the 5G domain and actual, tangible steps to counter
China's government and industry on the issue.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\329\ Jason Murdock, ``China Planning 500,000 New 5G Base Stations
as State Officials Say Construction Has 'Entered the Fast Lane',''
Newsweek, Feb. 24, 2020; Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem:
Risks and Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 13 (Apr.
2019).
\330\ Milo Medin & Gilman Louie, The 5G Ecosystem: Risks and
Opportunities for DoD, Defense Innovation Board, at 13 (Apr. 2019).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finally, the United States currently does not have a
domestic 5G supplier for the equipment that makes up the Radio
Access Network (RAN) for 5G.\331\ Instead, countries seeking
viable alternatives to Chinese 5G RAN infrastructure rely on
companies such as Swedish company Ericsson, South Korea-based
Samsung, or Finnish firm Nokia to build out core components of
their layer of the 5G infrastructure.\332\ While these
companies do provide alternatives to Huawei, Chinese government
subsidies to Huawei allow the company to sell products at far
lower prices and offer low-cost financing, undercutting the
competitiveness of other firms.\333\ This combination of a lack
of a U.S. domestic 5G alternative and China's monetary
subsidies is leading to a 5G environment that lacks stable,
secure U.S. infrastructure and products, and is increasingly
problematic for U.S. security. To maintain U.S. security, it is
therefore imperative that the United States find, develop, and
pursue policies that open up pathways for United States
industry to become a leading player in all facets of the 5G
domain in the future.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\331\ Tom Wheeler, ``5G in Five (not so) Easy Pieces,'' The
Brookings Institution, July 9, 2019; ``What are Radio Access Networks
and 5G RAN?,'' Verizon, Feb. 2, 2020, https://www.verizon.com/about/
our-company/5g/5g-radio-access-networks (last accessed July 10, 2020).
\332\ Tom Wheeler, ``5G in Five (not so) Easy Pieces,'' The
Brookings Institution, July 9, 2019.
\333\ Id.