WeChat and the Surveillance State • Hacker News Board

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#31

Post by ridewinter » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:35 PM UTC

Cypher wrote: post #25

vajaya wrote: post #14

basically Chinese government doesn't want its citizens to talk anything cultural, political, spiritual, religious, etc. If you wanna talk fashion, food, travel, music, and the likes, that's absolutely fine. and it seems Chinese people are perfectly content with it. I heard that wechat is transparent to Chinese authority. Last year, a dozens of college students who are Marxist activists and advocate for workers' right…

Well worker rights is a fantasy in the west too. Google and facebook track our every moves and the NSA can watch over our every move. The scary thing is few journalist are left to talk about it over here.

Nonsense. I don’t know of a single person afraid to express their political views in western countries, no matter how extreme or bizarre.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#32

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:38 PM UTC

ridewinter wrote: post #28

No, it’s an article by and for anyone with western values. You know, the values that resulted in 99% of the innovations in this world.

You can correlate, directly, the "Western value system" with 99% of innovations in this world?

Wow! I have questions!

1. What is the west?

2. What is the homogeneous value system of the west, in its entirety?

3. What is list of the inventions this value system?

4. How do we know it was these values that generated these innovations instead of other causes?

As you might expect, I am extremely skeptical! I'm particularly curious how you're going to deal what I view as a very non homogeneous concept of "Western values" (it is news to me to hear them lumped together like that), and where you'll draw your border on "The West." For example, surely your West definition must include the Arabian peninsula, for giving us mathematics, 0, and eye surgery. Surely also it must include China for giving us gunpowder and extensive bureaucracy? Oh and Japan for innovations in education systems!

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#33

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:42 PM UTC

Cypher wrote: post #25

vajaya wrote: post #14

basically Chinese government doesn't want its citizens to talk anything cultural, political, spiritual, religious, etc. If you wanna talk fashion, food, travel, music, and the likes, that's absolutely fine. and it seems Chinese people are perfectly content with it. I heard that wechat is transparent to Chinese authority. Last year, a dozens of college students who are Marxist activists and advocate for workers' right…

Well worker rights is a fantasy in the west too. Google and facebook track our every moves and the NSA can watch over our every move. The scary thing is few journalist are left to talk about it over here.

The NSA can't watch our every move, that's illegal.

We learned from Edward Snowden that they do so for some people anyway, illegally. It's bad and wrong.

It's not nearly at the level of China.

America doesn't have xinjiang reeducation camps for political dissidents that also happens to be full of people charged with the crime of being religious.

America isn't harvesting the organs of its prisoners against their will.

The consequences of being caught by the Chinese surveillance machine is far, far worse in China than it is in the USA, which really doesn't even have it at the same level.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#34

Post by qrbLPHiKpiux » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:43 PM UTC

The digital war will be won with pencil and paper.

Jun 06 2019

Me

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#35

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:43 PM UTC

dvduval wrote: post #21

Facebook/Twitter have been used to manipulate politics in many countries. China does not want WeChat to be used in a similar way. Somehow here in the US/West everyone gets the real news?

The Chinese government will use WeChat data to arrest and make dissidents vanish.

Fakenews is not a threat great enough to justify this.

There is no equivalence between what is happening in China and what we are dealing with in the USA.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#36

Post by throwaway84_TO » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:52 PM UTC

Cypher wrote: post #23

gen3 wrote: post #5

I'm glad this article was written. I think the general public is unaware of how China operates, and through education we can better protect our own civil liberties (and better understand why the China is the way that it is).

I do wonder how long it's going to be before we see WhatsApp and the surveillance state articles.

I think that in the west, we have a different dynamic between tech and government - one that makes a huge difference.

In China, it would appear that the government is deeply involved with WeChat (which itself, is deeply entrenched in everybody's lives). This close co-operation gives them access and control to monitor their citizens - leaving the possibility of an Orwellian system.

In the west, instead, its a little bit more back and forth between tech and government. The big tech companies take advantage of opportunities they discover (for the purposes of profit) with the government subsequently cracking down on activity they deem abusive and harmful. Conversely, if the government itself seeks to spy on or inappropriately extend its reach into people's privacy, the tech companies are big enough to stand together and object to these types of intrusions. Cases such as those involving the government seeking to break into an iPhone and Apple refusing to help or with Facebook making WhatsApp E2E encrypted by default (and soon Messenger as well) are a few examples that come to mind.

With the current uproar and battle cry to break these big tech companies up, part of me feels that we might collaterally lose this balance of power between the two.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#37

Post by ridewinter » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 3:56 PM UTC

komali2 wrote: post #32

ridewinter wrote: post #28

No, it’s an article by and for anyone with western values. You know, the values that resulted in 99% of the innovations in this world.

You can correlate, directly, the "Western value system" with 99% of innovations in this world? Wow! I have questions! 1. What is the west? 2. What is the homogeneous value system of the west, in its entirety? 3. What is list of the inventions this value system? 4. How do we know it was these values that generated these innovations instead of other causes? As you might expect, I am extremely skeptical! I'm particularl…

Western values: freedom of speech, the ability to remove bad leaders, etc.

IMO, all of the historical innovations you mention in the Arabian peninsula, China and Japan happened during periods of relative openness in those cultures.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#38

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 4:00 PM UTC

I used to hold a kind of naive hope that the ham fisted Party would eventually be replaced with democracy. I remember back in 2011 my friends that were placed in moderately distinguished positions were sending their kids to Canada to collect foreign dual citizenship, fully expecting the collapse of the PRC in their lifetime.

But now I think the Party is too good at maintaining itself. It's augmented by technology like WeChat to know exactly what is going on across the whole country. Access to dissident conversations will make it even easier to tailor the kind of subtle propaganda they're getting very good at.

Will the PRC just continue to exist as it is, forever? My last remaining hope is for massive power grabs by xi jinping (already happening), followed by government ineptitude as he ages and underlings squabble, followed by chaos upon his death. Beyond that I can't see any way out.

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#39

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 4:03 PM UTC

ridewinter wrote: post #37

komali2 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can correlate, directly, the "Western value system" with 99% of innovations in this world? Wow! I have questions! 1. What is the west? 2. What is the homogeneous value system of the west, in its entirety? 3. What is list of the inventions this value system? 4. How do we know it was these values that generated these innovations instead of other causes? As you might expect, I am extremely skeptical! I'm particularl…

Western values: freedom of speech, the ability to remove bad leaders, etc. IMO, all of the historical innovations you mention in the Arabian peninsula, China and Japan happened during periods of relative openness in those cultures.

Interesting - so those values existed well before our modern concept of "the west," in a place we probably wouldn't call "the west" during a period of time when "the west" was very "not open?" For example, during the dark ages, Inquisitions, etc?

Why call it "western values?" Why not just specifically refer to the values by name?

Re: WeChat and the Surveillance State

#40

Post by komali2 » Sat, Jun 08, 2019, 4:07 PM UTC

eof wrote: post #11

dpflan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind elaborating this thought?

Presumably by creating ai generated personas dissidents could get some manner of protection from this type of surveillance.

Imagine deep faking Party members.

I'm sure the state will do so happily to politically assassinate officials that don't fall in line, but imagine if the people started doing the same to the Big Dogs, like to jinping himself. The possibilities are exciting ...