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China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

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Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#41

Post by Lammy »

op03 wrote: post #35
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #10

Ultimately, what would such a system be optimized for? The goals will be modulated by the persons or groups in power. From what I've seen, the powerful in China seek a stable, well behaved, productive workforce such that the profit from their labor can accrue to the benefit of the ruling class. A data collection system as pervasive as the social credit system that feeds into a self-optimizing control center that can…

You give them too much credit. There is no such fine grained control. Its more like an ant hill or an endocrine system.

It’s even worse than that: no direct fine-grained control, because the system trains the grains to control themselves and each other.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#42

Post by x3n0ph3n3 »

digdigdag wrote: post #36

How is this, in principle, different from the credit scoring system in western states? Lenders, banks, landlords, employers, insurance companies, utilities and hell even your cable company can assess the level of service rendered to you based on your score. I'm not saying China's system is identical to a FICO score -- but one would be remiss to not see the parallels in the intention of both systems.

FICO is not currently weaponized against political opponents and there's some level of recourse against inaccurate information in your credit report.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#43

Post by gumby »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #18
gumby wrote: post #5

I’m pretty sure Equifax et al aggregate this info as well (well perhaps not yet your trash-sorting) such as arrest records and probably social media activity as an option, or future option, to swizzle into credit rating.

False, Equifax does not have access to all of facebook chat records. China has access to WeChat.

I was thinking of public FB, Twitter etc activity. But you raise an important point.

FB scans and processes all FB messenger traffic as does Twitter DMs (unlike, say, iMessage or, currently, SMS). They use the info for the usual customization, profiling, and ad sales. I don’t believe they sell the actual data itself but really there’s no reason why not, or why they couldn’t sell scoring info to the big guys.

And now I think of it, FB, Google, and Amazon could easily buy those bureaux (each could buy one) to supercharge the rating system in both directions. It would be like Google’s purchase of doubleclick.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#44

Post by s3r3nity »

digdigdag wrote: post #36

How is this, in principle, different from the credit scoring system in western states? Lenders, banks, landlords, employers, insurance companies, utilities and hell even your cable company can assess the level of service rendered to you based on your score. I'm not saying China's system is identical to a FICO score -- but one would be remiss to not see the parallels in the intention of both systems.

You can't lose FICO score points simply because you missed a dinner reservation, or gave a negative political opinion against the political party in power.

This is a weak equivalency, akin to saying they're equivalent to school grading systems, simply because they assess a level of service in regards to studying.

FICO is a financial measure meant to assess risk for certain financial transactions - the domain is pretty limited.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#45

Post by gumby »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #8
gumby wrote: post #5

I’m pretty sure Equifax et al aggregate this info as well (well perhaps not yet your trash-sorting) such as arrest records and probably social media activity as an option, or future option, to swizzle into credit rating.

Your credit rating doesn't affect your ability to go to a concert or buy an airline ticket.

It would be possible for restaurant and hotel booking sites to check your Yelp reviews and allow restaurants or hotels to bar reservations for people who leave bad reviews.

Those “share” buttons on web sites allow the big aggregators to connect accounts on various sites.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#46

Post by AlexTWithBeard »

Barrin92 wrote: post #17
throwaway0a5e wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>private sector credit systems have the same or similar result in dictating outcomes I don't know how anyone can say this with a straight face. In the west you can be bankrupt and still buy a first class airline ticket or go to a concert or do damn near anything else so long as you aren't using credit to do it.

you meet many bankrupt people on luxury cruises and first class airline tickets? What's astonishing to me is how we in the West have created this metaphysical alternative reality where poor people are taught to think they have the chance to live in mansions or fly on luxury airlines, if it weren't for the fact that they're poor, of course. In contrast to the cruel Chinese, we also have majestic legal equality, where…

> where the millionaires and the poor are equally punished for sleeping on park benches

The only logical alternative would be that millionaires and poor to be unequally punished for sleeping on park benches.

How's that better?

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#47

Post by FandangoRanger »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #18
gumby wrote: post #5

I’m pretty sure Equifax et al aggregate this info as well (well perhaps not yet your trash-sorting) such as arrest records and probably social media activity as an option, or future option, to swizzle into credit rating.

False, Equifax does not have access to all of facebook chat records. China has access to WeChat.

We don't know what Equifax has. Maybe there's no proof that they have access to Facebook and Gmail and the like, but they may well have it and there's no way to know they don't. These big companies have serious trust issues to overcome and they do comply with the law in countries which DO have social credit systems.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#48

Post by mensetmanusman »

gumby wrote: post #43
mensetmanusman wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

False, Equifax does not have access to all of facebook chat records. China has access to WeChat.

I was thinking of public FB, Twitter etc activity. But you raise an important point. FB scans and processes all FB messenger traffic as does Twitter DMs (unlike, say, iMessage or, currently, SMS). They use the info for the usual customization, profiling, and ad sales. I don’t believe they sell the actual data itself but really there’s no reason why not, or why they couldn’t sell scoring info to the big guys. And now…

FB also doesn’t have a prison system or armed forces.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#49

Post by gumby »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #18
gumby wrote: post #5

I’m pretty sure Equifax et al aggregate this info as well (well perhaps not yet your trash-sorting) such as arrest records and probably social media activity as an option, or future option, to swizzle into credit rating.

False, Equifax does not have access to all of facebook chat records. China has access to WeChat.

When you say “China” do you mean the Chinese government? It’s pretty clear the US has pervasive access to us company data, whether via techniques documented by Snowden or the massive rise in classified NSLs.

But in the US it is preferred that such systems be assembled in the private sector and not restricted in a way that government oversight would be.

Re: China's social credit system is both unique and part of a global trend

#50

Post by HashingtheCode »

op03 wrote: post #35
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #10

Ultimately, what would such a system be optimized for? The goals will be modulated by the persons or groups in power. From what I've seen, the powerful in China seek a stable, well behaved, productive workforce such that the profit from their labor can accrue to the benefit of the ruling class. A data collection system as pervasive as the social credit system that feeds into a self-optimizing control center that can…

You give them too much credit. There is no such fine grained control. Its more like an ant hill or an endocrine system.

Once a person has a score, all their credit behavior in life is recorded and can be evaluated by that number. The goal is to force people to obey out of fear of punishment in the reduction of this number and the resulting restrictions, which ultimately is expressed by the CCP in the following manner:

"It will allow the trustworthy to roam freely under heaven while making it hard for the discredited to take a single step"

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