Lizhi Lu, an assistant professor in the McDonough School of Business and faculty affiliate of the Department of Government at Georgetown University, recently discussed data politics on the Center for Strategic and International Studies podcast.
Joining Lu on the podcast was Freeman Chair Jude Blanchette. The duo discussed China’s economy in a digital world. China monitors its citizens through tools such as facial recognition, with the goal of ensuring social stability, according to Discourse Magazine.
The Chinese government’s multi-faceted approach to collecting foreign data can present a challenge to the United States and other countries attempting to protect their data, according to the magazine. Many countries have expressed concern over technological projects manufacturing in China containing coding that enables monitoring. Chinese firms have also been evaluated by the U.S. government for potential security threats. For example, Chinese drone manufacturer DJI was scrutinized by the Federal Communications Commission over concerns data from the drones was being funneled to China.
“I think for Beijing, definitely back in 2000, you already see that the government has been promoting the strategy of different aspects of digital economy, you see a very clear trajectory of Beijing’s increasing emphasis on the strategic value of data,” Liu said in the podcast. “In 2014, Beijing made big data a national strategy, encouraging the collection and the use of big data to modernize the economy and governance. This also includes, very interestingly, the construction of a massive national data center in Guangdong province. Basically, they’re having this facilitating the exchange and sales of data.”
The Hill reports that the Chinese government uses an internal internet surveillance network to collect data on foreign targets through platforms such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. The Chinese government is also reportedly advancing programs to aid more efficient data collection.
FBI Director, Christopher Wray, stated that the FBI opens two new counterintelligence cases against China every day, according to FBI News.
“When we tally up what we see in our investigations, over 2,000 of which are focused on the Chinese government trying to steal our information or technology- there is just no country that presents a broader threat to our ideas, our innovation and our economic security than China,” Wray said.
China’s National Development and Reform Commission is doubling the amount of data center mega clusters in the country, according to Data Center Dynamics (DCD). These new state-sanctioned data centers are part of the “Eastern Data Western Calculation” initiative, which ensures the new centers are in locations where they have sufficient electricity.
“The eight national computing hubs as the backbone connection to China’s computing network, will develop data center clusters, carry out collaborative construction between data centers, cloud computing, and big data, and Bridge the gap between eastern and western regions in computing resources,” the Commission said, per DCD.
The data centers are expected to generate as much as $63 billion each year, DCD reported.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is a nonprofit policy research organization that was founded in 1962 and focuses on national security issues.
