Earlier quoted context omitted.
He doesn't need to be a computer expert to recognize a force multiplier when he sees one.
I doubt very much that he understands, even in the most basic terms, what any of this is about. Nor does he really care about any of it. Source: am a Russian-American, with a pretty good understanding of what's going on over there.
Authoritarian survivors like him tend to have an extremely well tuned grasp of threats to their power. Whether those are technology based or people, and whether they are domestic or foreign based. The small group of people running the CCP are similarly competent at spotting such threats, regardless of their understanding of technology. Most of the politicians that have supported the great firewall over the years, very likely had a limited understanding of the technology involved. They didn't need to understand the technology at an intimate level, they understood some of what it could enable, they understood the potential threat to their power. These people develop an almost sixth sense about it, they spend their entire lives cultivating that awareness as a means of survival and promotion.