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China's Xinjiang surveillance is the dystopian future nobody wants

342 points by Ajedi32 9y ago

logfromblammo 9y ago
<deleted>
- dang 9y ago
  Could you please not do that here?
- dylz 9y ago
  It very clearly sets it to display = block the line after, if you ran a normal browser.
  - Arnavion 9y ago
    It's... certainly one way to make sure your site only works with JS enabled.
  - hjek 9y ago
    Yes, but in a flippin <script> tag. Is this to weed out the readers who don't have JavaScript enabled? Luckily Links2 supports neither JavaScript nor CSS. People in China should start using that, as to not take part in The Great Cannon.
  - eat_veggies 9y ago
    While logfromblammo's response is kind of immature (and this probably isn't the right thread to voice that concern in), I sort of agree. It sets it to display: block in javascript, meaning the page is unusable if you're blocking scripts for performance/tracking reasons. I tested the page with javascript disabled and manually set the html element back to display: block and it renders just fine.
  - PricelessValue 9y ago
    > It very clearly sets it to display = block the line after That's the point he is making. > if you ran a normal browser. What's a normal browser?
- PricelessValue 9y ago
  How on earth can this be flagged on "hacker" news?
otoburb 9y ago
>>For the next 10 months, web access would be almost nonexistent in Xinjiang, a vast region larger than Texas with a population of more than 20 million. It was one of the most widespread, longest internet shutdowns ever. SpaceX's plans to launch their first set of satellites for their Starlink broadband constellation[1]. Uighers may be the first population to sign up for satellite subscriptions, although the Chinese government is probably looking for ways to extend Great Firewall[2] capabilities to satellites too. Hopefully users can afford the tentative pricing model of $750/year for a Starlink subscription. [1] http://www.dw.com/en/spacexs-starlink-satellite-internet-its-time-for-tough-talk-on-cyber-security-in-space/a-42678704 http://www.dw.com/en/spacexs-starlink-satellite-internet-its... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall
- elefanten 9y ago
  Enter the international politics of geosovereignty over the EM spectrum...
- analyst74 9y ago
  This is exciting news! I wonder if this will trigger space warfare, which might push nations to invest more into space, and maybe we'll finally become space-faring species in my lifetime!
  - colemannugent 9y ago
    Well, that's one way to do it lol. Hurry up Musk!
  - toomanybeersies 9y ago
    Or alternatively space warfare will trigger Kessler Syndrome, and we'll be trapped on this planet until we find a way to clean up all the debris.
    - lorenzhs 9y ago
      The risk of Kessler Syndrome is being exaggerated a lot on HN. These new, very large satellite constellations aren't in stable orbits, they only last for a few years before decaying naturally. So even if every satellite there were to be destroyed by some magical event, the debris would re-enter the atmosphere within at most a couple of years. It would be quite bad if geostationary orbits became unusable, but there are way fewer satellites there, and GEO is becoming less important for many of its traditional applications (e.g. communication, see for example the spacex starlink project which just had its first two test satellites launched, or planet labs' constellation of small and cheap imaging satellites). Much of this is due to a reduction in launch prices and a focus on many small and cheap satellites, instead of few large and expensive ones.
vondur 9y ago
I'm pretty sure that's exactly what the Chinese authorities want. What everyone else wants isn't their concern.
- ghostcluster 9y ago
  they actually have a very tense, tenuous relationship with their citeznry and its propensity for public demonstrations that keep the government in line. there is a breaking point they know they have to avoid. > The number of annual protests has grown steadily since the early 1990s, from approximately 8700 “mass group incidents” in 1993[1] to over 87,000 in 2005.[2] In 2006, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences estimated the number of annual mass incidents to exceed 90,000, and Chinese sociology professor Sun Liping estimated 180,000 incidents in 2010.[3][4] Mass incidents are defined broadly as "planned or impromptu gathering that forms because of internal contradictions", and can include public speeches or demonstrations, physical clashes, public airings of grievances, and other group behaviors that are seen as disrupting social stability. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_and_dissent_in_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_and_dissent_in_China
  - smallnamespace 9y ago
    At least a few years ago, de Toqueville's 'On the Old Regime and the Revolution' was on the Communist Party's reading list [1]. The Chinese Civil War of '49 and then the Cultural Revolution (where most of the then-current Party leadership suffered) is still within living memory of the ruling class. Of course they understand that there is an implicit contract between themselves and the rest of society, even if it the terms of the deal are not arrived at in a democratic fashion. The question is not whether China will eventually devolve more political power to the populace——that is almost a given, considering the growing economic and cultural power of the middle class; it's whether this will happen suddenly and violently via another revolution, or gradually by the Party bringing dissenting voices into the fold widening the circle of acceptable, public political discourse. [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/china/2013/01/15/chinese-society-through-the-prism-of-past-revolutions/#4d584b13234a https://www.forbes.com/sites/china/2013/01/15/chinese-societ...
toephu2 9y ago
On the plus side, I just visited China last month and never felt safer. Before you would wear your backpack on the front of your chest when taking public transportation for fear of thieves. Now, with surveillance everywhere (and random ID checks at subways), you can freely wear your backpack on your back where it belongs without fear of theft.
- musage 9y ago
  When you were there, did you visit or even help anyone who got, say, jailed for their dissenting opinion? Dare I guess? If we could make magically avoid all buffer overflows in all languages, forever, by imprisoning all red headed people forever, would that be okay? Would our increased comfort be worth their increased discomfort? If George Orwell and others had known that we'd end up welcoming total surveillance because then we don't have to wear our backpack on the front of our chest, they probably wouldn't have bothered to write. My head is kinda spinning from that, to be honest. I knew it's bad, but I had no idea it's this bad.
- gcb0 9y ago
  without fear of theft, political organizational, labour bargaining groups, religious freedom, etc, etc.
  - whooshee 9y ago
    Ah, unfortunately, there are many theft and violence in quite a few big Western cities.
- Feniks 9y ago
  You're not wrong, article looks at it from a Western viewpoint. This surveillance is actually not new. Its a throwback to imperial China, with technology added to it. I can imagine a lot of Chinese prefer it to lawlessness. It does cost vast amounts of money though. China spends more on surveillance and the police than the entire military budget.
  - headsoup 9y ago
justicezyx 9y ago
A side note: The terrorist attacks (what the CCP states) in Xinjiang was rampant. Every years hundreds of innocent people were killed. And due to media control, those reports seldom see publicity outside of small forums in the first a few months following the events. ps1: Whether or not those attacks are done by terrorists, or oppressed minorities, I have no comments. ps2: This not a defend. Merely suggest one of the motivating factors. Whether or not CCP intentionally let that happen so they can do this, I have no comments.
- bilbo0s 9y ago
  "...Whether or not those attacks are done by terrorists, or oppressed minorities, I have no comments...." ??? If "...oppressed minorities..." commit acts wherein "...hundreds of innocent people were killed..." aren't they "terrorists"? Or am I thinking about this whole thing wrong?
  - thinkpad20 9y ago
    One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. I think the parent post simply meant that they were not passing judgment on the justification of the violence.
    - whooshee 9y ago
      If those attackers attacked police or gov't, they may call themselves a freedom figher. But If a guy randomly kills innocent people to show their agendas, he is definitely a terrorist, which was what happened in Xinjiang and other cities in China by some terrorist groups. Unfortunately, there was some western press quoted terrorist when they were covering those attacks.
  - samplatt 9y ago
    Pretty sure OP was just adding that in so that they'd avoid needless discussion regarding emotionally-charged labels like 'terrorist'. The term almost certainly applies, but lets talk about the acts and the environment itself, rather than perpetrators of horrific acts and their presumable-but-technically-unknown motivations.
liberte82 9y ago
Unrelated, but I'm always amazed when I hear about these massive Chinese cities for the first time. Apparently Urumqi has a population of 3.5 million.
- antishatter 9y ago
  Recently went to Xian which locals had described to be as being more of a small village feel. A mere 8m population.
  - thinkpad20 9y ago
    Xian at least has thousands of years of history. On the bullet train in China you’ll often pass by cities of millions of people which might have been mere hamlets a generation or two ago. The size of China, its economic renaissance and the fact that good jobs in China are almost exclusively found in urban areas has led to a vast migration towards city centers which is pretty much unprecedented in human history.
    - nerfhammer 9y ago
      It's almost as if growing cities are economic growth multipliers and perhaps even a key part of that whole civilization thing. Meanwhile over here it's taken as assumed that cities cannot and/or should not grow ever again.
      - thinkpad20 9y ago
        > Meanwhile over here it's taken as assumed that cities cannot and/or should not grow ever again. How do you mean?
        coderdude 9y ago
        Even more likely than what those guys said: there's no room for expansion. What is Anaheim going to do, eat Santa Ana to become bigger?
PricelessValue 9y ago
> China's Xinjiang surveillance is the dystopian future nobody wants What silly clickbait. I swear the media ( or propaganda ) sure loves to scaremonger with "china". The brits want it. Europe wants it. Russia wants it. And the liberal and conservatives in the US want it. The leading surveillance systems in the world aren't in china. It's in britain. It's in the US. Edit: Holy cow, the brigade is strong here.
- bob_theslob646 9y ago
  >The leading surveillance systems in the world aren't in china. It's in britain. It's in the US How do you even measure that? I have no idea what you're are saying means?
  - PricelessValue 9y ago
    > How do you even measure that? How about on a per capita basis? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/06/tony-porter-surveillance-commissioner-risk-cctv-public-transparent https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/06/tony-porter-su... Or how about 1. In terms of quality and sophistication tech. US and Britain pioneered most of the surveillance tech. 2. Experience and age? We have decades head start on the chinese when it comes to tech surveillance. 3. We are more "connected" and a more urban society with surveillable data? Nearly 50% of china still lives in rural areas.
    - kasey_junk 9y ago
      I don’t have a dog in this fight other than to note “nearly 50% of China” is a massive number.
    - rconti 9y ago
      So "leading surveillance systems in the world" means: 1. Who "started it" 2. How long they've been doing it 3. Percentage of people affected by it (not number!) In other words, you worked backwards to produce vague descriptions of metrics by which your point would be true. If it weren't for the fact that these vague metrics in no way support your assertion.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago
How much do you want to bet that a lot of these technologies are built on open source software? If it was a company that was licensing software to them, there would be someone to hold accountable, but with open source, you just make and release something and it is not your problem who uses it for what.
- toomanybeersies 9y ago
  This is the most bizarre argument against OSS that I've ever read.
gugudollz 9y ago
There has never been internet shutdown in Kenya. TV stations were switched off but never internet. If China establishes autocratic regimes in the global South it will seize those governments and leverage that to gain power over the West. It's myopic to think their goal is anything less than absolute domination of the world.
- Barrin92 9y ago
  It's probably safe to assume that China wants to increase its influence, but accusing any country of plans of 'absolute domination' based on domestic surveillance probably says more about the psyche of the accuser than anyone else
  - gugudollz 9y ago
    The article talks about exporting the tech to the global South, not me. The goal not being in the export itself but in the subjugation of those people under a central point of capture. From there, it's obvious who remains: the West.
  - woodandsteel 9y ago
    Where would you say China is trying to go in the long-term, internationally? I get the impression it wants to be the global hegemon, but perhaps I am wrong.
    - nickik 9y ago
      Based on what? What has China done in the last 40 years that would even close to imply that? There is still a part of China that is not even controlled by China (Taiwan). They are surrounded by lots of other powerful countries, Russia, India, Japan and so on. The US military is driving around right in front of them. They are getting accused of wanting global hegemony based on thing like building bases in the South China Sea. Something that other countries have done before China. Seems to me if anything China has behaved incredibly passive. Maybe in the back of their minds they have the idea that this strategy will lead to some kind of soft hegemony but that is just speculation based on nothing.
gcb0 9y ago
most people doesn't recognise that this is the "I don't have anything to hide"-folks wetest dream. this kind of article is just free advertisement for the companies selling this crap. even here, the top comment now is about how someone never felt safer in China, probably because they " have nothing to hide"
normayzer 9y ago
CCP: Chinese citizens are ready for democracy!
pentae 9y ago
So can anyone tell me why we should support what China is doing? Why should any entrepreneur or tech worker go there and support this government? How come China seems to get a free pass on human rights issues like this by western society?
- yusuke10 9y ago
  So the short answer is, don't support China. Long answer is - reduce buying stuff from China. - reduce buying stuff on aliexpress or alibaba or even amazon. try buying local - call out leaders and entrepreneurs on social media when they are acquiescing/favorable to China (Tim Cook, Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, etc) - try to start up manufacturing of hardwares in your city/state/country - call out China's totalitarianism in your circle of influence
  - devwinportable 9y ago
    +1 especially with China backing North Korean regime publicly/privately
- _cs2017_ 9y ago
  Because keeping a large diverse country stable and safe is very difficult, and a failure causes enormous tragedy. The approach that works to keep the US stable does not always work well in other countries. To keep the billion people who live in China safe from civil war and rampant terrorism is already a great achievement -- even it comes at the expense of some nice things such as human rights. In fact, China manages to do more than just keep itself stable; it's actually improving economically. That state of affairs is a lot better than many, many countries can even dream about. A push for human rights increases the chance of a government collapse. That's what happened in the Soviet Russia during Gorbachev. It was everyone's luck that it resulted in relatively little suffering. A similar fall of the government in Syria, Yugoslavia, Iraq, etc were absolutely horrible for the people living in those countries. It is very hard to accept even a small risk of such an event in China; the suffering it would cause is beyond imagination. Therefore, many people are quite happy with the approach followed by the Chinese government. In fact, it gives many people a hope that China might become a little similar to Singapore. The Singapore government has some issues with human rights (of course, much more modest than China), but is still highly respected both inside and outside the country precisely due to the prosperity and safety it brought to people. Of course, for people who absolutely prioritize human rights, this is not good enough. But such people have relatively little influence outside the Western civilization. One certainly cannot blame people who prioritize the safety and prosperity of their family above human rights, and these people seem to be by far the majority of the Chinese population.
wrg91237 9y ago
Reason for surveillance. London and Paris may do the same if there are more attacks. "Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri released a statement supporting Jihad in Xinjiang against Chinese, in the Caucasus against the Russians and naming Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan as places of warfare.[42] Zawahiri endorsed "jihad to liberate every span of land of the Muslims that has been usurped and violated, from Kashgar to Andalusia, and from the Caucasus to Somalia and Central Africa".[43] Uyghurs inhabit Kashgar, the city which was mentioned by Zawahiri.[44]" They don't want moderation. "The Uyghur terrorist organization East Turkestan Islamic Movement's magazine Islamic Turkistan has accused the Chinese "Muslim Brotherhood" (the Yihewani) of being responsible for the moderation of Hui Muslims and the lack of Hui joining terrorist jihadist groups in addition to blaming other things for the lack of Hui Jihadists, such as the fact that for more than 300 years Hui and Uyghurs have been enemies of each other, no separatist Islamist organizations among the Hui, the fact that the Hui view China as their home, and the fact that the "infidel Chinese" language is the language of the Hui.[33][34]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_China#Xinjiang https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_China#Xinjiang "A 2016 study from New America, a Washington-based think tank, found 114 Uighurs from Xinjiang joined the Islamic State. Xinjiang furnished the highest number of foreign ISIS fighters from any one region of the world outside of Saudi Arabia and Tunisia, the study found." http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/01/the-islamic-state-pledged-to-attack-china-next-heres-why/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/01/the-islamic-state-pledge...
- sctb 9y ago
  You've been violating this guideline, could you please stop? > We ban accounts that use Hacker News primarily for political or ideological battle, regardless of which politics they favor. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
risent 9y ago
Freedom is not free. The majority of world are like peace, but the minority can break it with terrorist attacks. To prevent the attacks, the majority will pay a huge price. In the other way, the minority's attacks will create Nationalism in the majority, and this will make the attacks more worse. Is there any way to resolve this?
- andrepd 9y ago
  This is a false dillema. Show me any evidence that massive surveillance increases security. There are many things that increase peace and security: wealth, education, good institutions/political systems, arguably culture, etc. Surveillance is probably not one of them.
  - risent 9y ago
    I agree with your opinion. But the problem is that: every option in your comment is a long term policy, it can't resolve the current problem in the reality as quick as possible.
thinkhard 9y ago
China does not give a fxxx. You do not feel the pain 'cause you are not the victim or relative/friend of the victim of the terror attack. What kind of human rights are taken away by PUBLIC surveillance?
Cw67NTN8F 9y ago
I am sure Dept X has plans ready, just waiting for the opportune moment to implement it in USA. To protect the children or something... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number-plate_recognition#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number-plate_recogni... Mobile ANPR is becoming a significant component of municipal predictive policing strategies and intelligence gathering, as well as for recovery of stolen vehicles, identification of wanted felons, and revenue collection from individuals who are delinquent on city or state taxes or fines, or monitoring for "Amber Alerts". With the widespread implementation of this technology, many U.S. states now issue misdemeanor citations of up to $500 when a license plate is identified as expired or on the incorrect vehicle. Successfully recognized plates may be matched against databases including "wanted person", "protection order", missing person, gang member, known and suspected terrorist, supervised release, immigration violator, and National Sex Offender lists. In addition to the real-time processing of license plate numbers, ANPR systems in the US collect (and can indefinitely store) data from each license plate capture. Images, dates, times and GPS coordinates can be stockpiled and can help place a suspect at a scene, aid in witness identification, pattern recognition or the tracking of individuals.
whisk 9y ago
I have read some stories during the year without Internet in Xinjiang. In fact people can still connect to local network then, they just disconnected the link from province level ISP to Internet. Some young mans built local websites provides movie, softwares downloads, news and bbs inside the LAN. They travels to nearest town outside Xinjiang every week by train, download new resources in net bar, bring them back in hard disk and update their websites. Nobody knows how long will the disconnection last and somebody prepared to maintain the LAN from long years. It makes me recall 20 years ago I access contents on Internet through CD-ROM in magazines. In the end, the Internet recovered and these websites soon disappeared.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- themodelplumber 9y ago
  Wow. I love hearing about the persistence under those conditions. Reminds me a bit of what I've heard of Cuba, a semi-sneakernet setup.
  - girvo 9y ago
    It’s even cooler than that. In Havana, there’s a local network via Ethernet cables strung between buildings, that you can use hacked video game consoles to play against others on, among other things!
  - rqs 9y ago
    I'm not local, but actually, there are many stories published by locals during that time, most of it are written in Chinese of course. You can still found some of it by googling keyword "新疆断网", and Google Translate them if you interested to read. In summary: In the first few days, people miss the access; Then, they built their own network, providing news, BBS, downloading and even online gaming services etc. If they had enough time, I could assume they will build a complete alternative of China's Internet, just like what happened in the China's Internet then the access to the true Internet is limited. But "enough time" is what they don't have, when the access been restored, most local websites are faded.
ChoGGi 9y ago
If an oppressive government can shut down internet access whenever they want, then it seems the real problem is losing paper news to digital. I'd say a decentralized mesh network is a step in the right direction, but if there's spyware on all the phones; that doesn't help as much.
fdsak 9y ago
"Western viewpoint" is creating more problems than solutions and behind that there is fear of capitalist losing business and control over world affairs. Its not human rights in China or anything else, if that was the case the recent wars in Middle East might not have erupted and have been diffused with much sense of urgency and political acumen than supplying arms to rebels and wipe-out humanity on their way of interests. Democracy, human rights and all these terms are just fancy words to get financial and political advantage over weaker countries or adversaries. We do not need to be all democratic nations or republics to prosper intellectually and spiritually or in any other domain.West and Western people should stop now teaching other countries about human rights and democracy after what we have seen on global stage.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- drb91 9y ago
  Conflating democracy and capitalism certainly is terrible. Capitalism is also terrible & responsible for recent wars, since the opium wars to my tally. Maybe earlier? The french-indian war?
  - fdsak 9y ago
    Are they different now ? and to worst of our dreams they are now evolved to "imperialist" monster. They might look good in books only. I do not see any of them, see UN for example, the center for 21th century's humanity.
- foxhill 9y ago
  please, that’s not what this is about. this is an issue of individual liberty, and the freedom from oppression/being forced to live under someone else’s rules. these are desirable qualities for any self aware individual. no human, chinese or otherwise, wants to live without this concept of freedom.
  - fdsak 9y ago
soueuls 9y ago
I have personally lived long term both in the US and China (I am French) And I would choose China to raise my kids over the US any days. Yes there are repression in China, it would be a lie to deny it, yes I have been around a girl who smoked weed, she was 28-30 years old and she literally had to hide behind a car because it's completely forbidden, highly punished and another citizen can report you. But China has many advantages, public services are awesome. Unlike France and the US, the government is corrupt but they don't vote any law against Chinese themselves. It's a country which still have some kind of moral traditions and values so far. And last but not least I prefer government's surveillance than people's surveillance. It's far more easier to free think in China than it is in the US and France. The latter countries are closer to the sesame credit than the latter.
- rqs 9y ago
  > Unlike France and the US, the government is corrupt but they don't vote any law against Chinese themselves It's not very logical. By definition, the word "Law" means: a system of rules that are created and enforced through social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior[0]. Who's behavior? Trees? Mountains? No, people's behavior, people who living inside the territory of the country. So, the right way to put should be: China's laws are more restrict towards foreigners, which is reasonable, because: 1) Foreigners contributes less to the society than locals in general. 2) Foreigners have no proxy or benefiter in the government system, so nobody will speak for them. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law
  - Arn_Thor 9y ago
    I think the user you're responding to has it exactly backwards. Laws are more strictly applied to local Chinese than to tourists and expats. The general idea seems to be "these laowai are full of vices and they will do what they do, but we must instill and uphold a strict moral code for our own people to maintain a healthy society" (I'm of course speaking of petty law breaking such as smoking weed or jaywalking. If you steal or defraud someone you'll see your visa disappear faster than sin)
- taway483 9y ago
chvid 9y ago
What the article is forgetting is the severity of the conflict with its potent mix of race, religion and by-gone nationality. To me the parallels to the Uyghurs in Xinjiang are the conflicts involving the Rohingyas in Myanmar, the "deep south" in Thailand, and maybe the "pirates" around Malaysia and Philippines. These conflicts are all being handled with far heavier hand than what China is doing in Xinjiang.
powerapple 9y ago
1) There was no hijab in Xinjiang before and now it is very common. 2) DARPA has many research grants on ughyur language.
EGreg 9y ago
You guys may be concerned about China today. However, in the long run, with AI the humans are building a zoo for themselves. When machines are able to complete every task better, win every strategic confrontation, and so on, there will not be any point for humans to make any significant contributions - including art. Even video and audio will be faked easily. When their every move can be scrutinized and next moves easily predicted, they can be easily caged and controlled. Raised to go along with anything, because "resistance is futile". The world is being turned into monocultures and farms. And humans are building a zoo for themselves. No one will really run the place in the end.
- emanreus 9y ago
  To add to the irony, we are the ones doing it.
zachguo 9y ago
Xinjiang is under surveillance for a reason. They have blown up buses and killed thousands. Crime rate among Uyghurs community is also much higher.
- KozmoNau7 9y ago
  I presume you have reliable sources for those claims?
  - zachguo 9y ago
    I grew up in China. When I was little, there was a time that if a Uyghurs person get on the bus, everybody else on the bus would get off. Even nowadays people tend to get nervous when they see Uyghurs wandering on street.
    - eivarv 9y ago
      That doesn't necessarily mean it's reasonable to be suspicious towards an entire ethnic group. Not many Uyghurs support violence, and not all Uyghurs are separatists.
    - KozmoNau7 9y ago
      Replace "when I was little" with "1930s Germany" and "Uyghurs" with "Jews". A seed of distrust and paranoia was sown and was allowed to grow. That does not mean it has any basis in fact. You should also look at how the Chinese government has oppressed the Uyghurs (and Tibetans and Taiwanese, to name a few).
      - zachguo 9y ago
        I know biased stereotype is bad, and I totally agree not all Uyghurs are bad. I went to Uyghurs restaurant regularly and had Uyghurs classmates in college too.
        pertymcpert 9y ago
dandare 9y ago
Without pointing a finger, I will say I would be really surprised if this discussion - and HN in general - was not subject to a discourse control by paid state agents (sophisticated trolls) from China and elsewhere. Assuming that it is, what can we learn or do to miting such influences? Asking for independent source to all claims is obviously the first step.
- fdsak 9y ago
  That is the real problem with the liberty now. And I think liberty is dead under the pile of fake news generated by various parties interested in any issue. From war on terror to democracy and nuclear weapons the "agents" as you called, generates such a perception that we cannot escape, let alone our psychological biases and national, political and religious affiliations -- Welcome to the age of disinformation
  - stareatgoats 9y ago
    Whoa, that was a depressing stance. Whereas you point to several serious problems I would hope the absolutism is there for rhetoric reasons! Personally I think it may still be argued that the information age holds the potential for greater knowledge than ever before, and factual liberty (as opposed to seeming) is very much a part of that. It just may not come quite as easy and automatically as perhaps once perceived.
    - fdsak 9y ago
      Yes its depressing to see lot of dead people under the rug of so-called liberal journalism and we are siting on that rug and talking about democracy and how to remove a dictator because we dont like him etc etc. I do like the "literary" ideas (don't know if that right word) which does not work practically. I am more concerned about the livelihood of people (alive), democracy is not for dead people. I don't deny the benefits of information age, that is huge blessings for everyone. Probably it will take some time to reap the real benefits but I am afraid the cost is getting higher, as too much information/disinformation to filter out facts from fictions. And in most of the cases states and media agencies are part of that fiction and friction created in the society, take it China or US.
logicallee 9y ago
This seems as good an article as any to ask: in people's opinion here, is there any risk for Americans going to China and continuing normal Internet browsing activities? (I know the following is not the best attitude, but I really do mean on a "nothing to hide" basis.) Someone in this thread mentioned $4.7 billion (quoted as 30B RMB in this thread) on the security and surveillance, for just Xinjiang, which has a population of 21m give or take, out of China's 1.37 billion people. That's obviously a lot of money (for comparison the entire US intelligence budget is maybe an order of magnitude higher annually), so I'd assume that when in China, and maybe outside of it, basically whatever you do can/could be monitored. I get the impression that if you're not, I don't know, doing detailed dissident planning it's not an issue, so this would seem the same standard as pretty free Americans would expect. In America, yeah if you spend 18 months downloading textbooks on bombmaking, buying laboratory equipment on Amazon, and then eventually industrial sizes of fertilizer, ammonia, and remote demolition detonators on Ali Express, while getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin from seling a 1-page haircut ebook which has 1 review stating it was useless, while you spend most of your time travelling between Syria and Washington DC, where you're at home on the dark net all day over tor, reading arabic language anti-American calls for terrorism and jihad, you would expect to get a visit at some point between when you start that journey and when you're on skype bidding your mother back home goodbye, saying that you will die for a worthy cause in your Jihad against the U.S. imperialist pigs and asking for her bank account information. I mean sure everything I've just stated (literally the entirety of this paragraph) falls under freedom of expression, freedom of thinking, and freedom of commerce, but as a practical matter you'd expect to be stopped at some point. So is that the standard? If I go to Beijing but I'm not spending eighteen months travelling between Beijing and Taiwan reading about how to arm rebels for a military coup, how to get what you want by taking political hostages, and taking geographic survey equipment across the street from state buildings in Beijing with a notebook and a "Insurrection for Dummies: How to lead an armed rebellion and communicate with your followers while toppling Beijing's military hegemony" book, as an American could I expect to continue my normal Internet browsing (including reading or posting about "sensitive topics" or whatever)? I mean on an everyday basis. Note that my Chinese example didn't include purchasing fertilizer and detonators, so I get that the standard could be a bit lower - but does normal American online behavior count? Or would an American not be able to enjoy their usual online freedom without getting lots of problems?
devwinportable 9y ago
China's quite notorious for sending back North Korean defectors (and cooperating with NK spy agencies for this) this isn't going well...
sonnhy 9y ago
They talk about China yet still a few realize that we are as well going into that direction. CCTV are everywhere, Facebook and Google have our identities, what we like, what we look for, what will be our probable next move (also in terms of real world position) and our routines. If ever a Chinese that feel safe in his home comes to the outer world (to us) he would say "how could this nation is so undeveloped to not already have a better security likes us" and we would be amazed and reply how he does not, instead, feel so stalked in his state. But still, if we were to go on a third world nation we would ask the same and the local people would reply at us the same way as we did to the chinese.
- fdsak 9y ago
  I think Chinese are not that smart to use some fancy words like "freedom of speech" "democracy" "individual liberty" but still doing same things as all other is doing. The problem here is how some country builds narrative and justification around her actions. Digital age is double edge sword and everyone is going to bleed under the pretext of security.
  - jonathanstrange 9y ago
    China is a one-party system in which the country is run by a single cadre of 'politicians'. There is corruption everywhere and there are Draconian laws which are applied selectively and sometimes enforced and sometimes not (e.g. half of all food stands in cities are illegal, riding motorbikes is illegal in many cities, etc.). Internet and phone calls are constantly monitored and filtered based on certain words to the extent that if you use a certain word even in a different and completely innocuous context your phone call is interrupted or your internet connection stops working. There are hundreds of political prisoners and laws are applied selectively based on your standing within the party. There are political re-education camps and critiques of the government are frequently arrested under bogus and clearly invented pretexts, are often often put under house arrest, and are constantly harassed and surveilled by all kinds of authorities. Public protests are persecuted as uprisings against the state, using various deliberately vague and overly broad laws. The idea that the differences between China and freer countries are merely a matter of the 'narrative' is patently ridiculous. It is also false, because according to the Chinese constitution, "...citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession, and of demonstration." So yes, China officially has the same narrative, it just doesn't have any due process, has massive surveillance not even remotely comparable to Western countries, and suffers from massive corruption in the hands of a single 'party'.
Synaesthesia 9y ago
What nobody wants is crushing poverty like in India, and Africa. I'm sure those peasants would consider life in China to be wonderful.

342 points by Ajedi32 9y ago

logfromblammo 9y ago

dang 9y ago
Could you please not do that here?
dylz 9y ago
It very clearly sets it to display = block the line after, if you ran a normal browser.
- Arnavion 9y ago
  It's... certainly one way to make sure your site only works with JS enabled.
- hjek 9y ago
  Yes, but in a flippin <script> tag. Is this to weed out the readers who don't have JavaScript enabled? Luckily Links2 supports neither JavaScript nor CSS. People in China should start using that, as to not take part in The Great Cannon.
- eat_veggies 9y ago
  While logfromblammo's response is kind of immature (and this probably isn't the right thread to voice that concern in), I sort of agree. It sets it to display: block in javascript, meaning the page is unusable if you're blocking scripts for performance/tracking reasons. I tested the page with javascript disabled and manually set the html element back to display: block and it renders just fine.
- PricelessValue 9y ago
  > It very clearly sets it to display = block the line after That's the point he is making. > if you ran a normal browser. What's a normal browser?
PricelessValue 9y ago
How on earth can this be flagged on "hacker" news?

otoburb 9y ago

>>For the next 10 months, web access would be almost nonexistent in Xinjiang, a vast region larger than Texas with a population of more than 20 million. It was one of the most widespread, longest internet shutdowns ever. SpaceX's plans to launch their first set of satellites for their Starlink broadband constellation[1]. Uighers may be the first population to sign up for satellite subscriptions, although the Chinese government is probably looking for ways to extend Great Firewall[2] capabilities to satellites too. Hopefully users can afford the tentative pricing model of $750/year for a Starlink subscription. [1] http://www.dw.com/en/spacexs-starlink-satellite-internet-its-time-for-tough-talk-on-cyber-security-in-space/a-42678704 http://www.dw.com/en/spacexs-starlink-satellite-internet-its... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Firewall

elefanten 9y ago
Enter the international politics of geosovereignty over the EM spectrum...
analyst74 9y ago
This is exciting news! I wonder if this will trigger space warfare, which might push nations to invest more into space, and maybe we'll finally become space-faring species in my lifetime!
- colemannugent 9y ago
  Well, that's one way to do it lol. Hurry up Musk!
- toomanybeersies 9y ago
  Or alternatively space warfare will trigger Kessler Syndrome, and we'll be trapped on this planet until we find a way to clean up all the debris.
  - lorenzhs 9y ago
    The risk of Kessler Syndrome is being exaggerated a lot on HN. These new, very large satellite constellations aren't in stable orbits, they only last for a few years before decaying naturally. So even if every satellite there were to be destroyed by some magical event, the debris would re-enter the atmosphere within at most a couple of years. It would be quite bad if geostationary orbits became unusable, but there are way fewer satellites there, and GEO is becoming less important for many of its traditional applications (e.g. communication, see for example the spacex starlink project which just had its first two test satellites launched, or planet labs' constellation of small and cheap imaging satellites). Much of this is due to a reduction in launch prices and a focus on many small and cheap satellites, instead of few large and expensive ones.

vondur 9y ago

I'm pretty sure that's exactly what the Chinese authorities want. What everyone else wants isn't their concern.

ghostcluster 9y ago
they actually have a very tense, tenuous relationship with their citeznry and its propensity for public demonstrations that keep the government in line. there is a breaking point they know they have to avoid. > The number of annual protests has grown steadily since the early 1990s, from approximately 8700 “mass group incidents” in 1993[1] to over 87,000 in 2005.[2] In 2006, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences estimated the number of annual mass incidents to exceed 90,000, and Chinese sociology professor Sun Liping estimated 180,000 incidents in 2010.[3][4] Mass incidents are defined broadly as "planned or impromptu gathering that forms because of internal contradictions", and can include public speeches or demonstrations, physical clashes, public airings of grievances, and other group behaviors that are seen as disrupting social stability. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_and_dissent_in_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_and_dissent_in_China
- smallnamespace 9y ago
  At least a few years ago, de Toqueville's 'On the Old Regime and the Revolution' was on the Communist Party's reading list [1]. The Chinese Civil War of '49 and then the Cultural Revolution (where most of the then-current Party leadership suffered) is still within living memory of the ruling class. Of course they understand that there is an implicit contract between themselves and the rest of society, even if it the terms of the deal are not arrived at in a democratic fashion. The question is not whether China will eventually devolve more political power to the populace——that is almost a given, considering the growing economic and cultural power of the middle class; it's whether this will happen suddenly and violently via another revolution, or gradually by the Party bringing dissenting voices into the fold widening the circle of acceptable, public political discourse. [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/china/2013/01/15/chinese-society-through-the-prism-of-past-revolutions/#4d584b13234a https://www.forbes.com/sites/china/2013/01/15/chinese-societ...

toephu2 9y ago

On the plus side, I just visited China last month and never felt safer. Before you would wear your backpack on the front of your chest when taking public transportation for fear of thieves. Now, with surveillance everywhere (and random ID checks at subways), you can freely wear your backpack on your back where it belongs without fear of theft.

musage 9y ago
When you were there, did you visit or even help anyone who got, say, jailed for their dissenting opinion? Dare I guess? If we could make magically avoid all buffer overflows in all languages, forever, by imprisoning all red headed people forever, would that be okay? Would our increased comfort be worth their increased discomfort? If George Orwell and others had known that we'd end up welcoming total surveillance because then we don't have to wear our backpack on the front of our chest, they probably wouldn't have bothered to write. My head is kinda spinning from that, to be honest. I knew it's bad, but I had no idea it's this bad.
gcb0 9y ago
without fear of theft, political organizational, labour bargaining groups, religious freedom, etc, etc.
- whooshee 9y ago
  Ah, unfortunately, there are many theft and violence in quite a few big Western cities.
Feniks 9y ago
You're not wrong, article looks at it from a Western viewpoint. This surveillance is actually not new. Its a throwback to imperial China, with technology added to it. I can imagine a lot of Chinese prefer it to lawlessness. It does cost vast amounts of money though. China spends more on surveillance and the police than the entire military budget.
- headsoup 9y ago

justicezyx 9y ago

A side note: The terrorist attacks (what the CCP states) in Xinjiang was rampant. Every years hundreds of innocent people were killed. And due to media control, those reports seldom see publicity outside of small forums in the first a few months following the events. ps1: Whether or not those attacks are done by terrorists, or oppressed minorities, I have no comments. ps2: This not a defend. Merely suggest one of the motivating factors. Whether or not CCP intentionally let that happen so they can do this, I have no comments.

bilbo0s 9y ago
"...Whether or not those attacks are done by terrorists, or oppressed minorities, I have no comments...." ??? If "...oppressed minorities..." commit acts wherein "...hundreds of innocent people were killed..." aren't they "terrorists"? Or am I thinking about this whole thing wrong?
- thinkpad20 9y ago
  One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter. I think the parent post simply meant that they were not passing judgment on the justification of the violence.
  - whooshee 9y ago
    If those attackers attacked police or gov't, they may call themselves a freedom figher. But If a guy randomly kills innocent people to show their agendas, he is definitely a terrorist, which was what happened in Xinjiang and other cities in China by some terrorist groups. Unfortunately, there was some western press quoted terrorist when they were covering those attacks.
- samplatt 9y ago
  Pretty sure OP was just adding that in so that they'd avoid needless discussion regarding emotionally-charged labels like 'terrorist'. The term almost certainly applies, but lets talk about the acts and the environment itself, rather than perpetrators of horrific acts and their presumable-but-technically-unknown motivations.

liberte82 9y ago

Unrelated, but I'm always amazed when I hear about these massive Chinese cities for the first time. Apparently Urumqi has a population of 3.5 million.

antishatter 9y ago
Recently went to Xian which locals had described to be as being more of a small village feel. A mere 8m population.
- thinkpad20 9y ago
  Xian at least has thousands of years of history. On the bullet train in China you’ll often pass by cities of millions of people which might have been mere hamlets a generation or two ago. The size of China, its economic renaissance and the fact that good jobs in China are almost exclusively found in urban areas has led to a vast migration towards city centers which is pretty much unprecedented in human history.
  - nerfhammer 9y ago
    It's almost as if growing cities are economic growth multipliers and perhaps even a key part of that whole civilization thing. Meanwhile over here it's taken as assumed that cities cannot and/or should not grow ever again.
    - thinkpad20 9y ago
      > Meanwhile over here it's taken as assumed that cities cannot and/or should not grow ever again. How do you mean?
      - coderdude 9y ago
        Even more likely than what those guys said: there's no room for expansion. What is Anaheim going to do, eat Santa Ana to become bigger?

PricelessValue 9y ago

> China's Xinjiang surveillance is the dystopian future nobody wants What silly clickbait. I swear the media ( or propaganda ) sure loves to scaremonger with "china". The brits want it. Europe wants it. Russia wants it. And the liberal and conservatives in the US want it. The leading surveillance systems in the world aren't in china. It's in britain. It's in the US. Edit: Holy cow, the brigade is strong here.

bob_theslob646 9y ago
>The leading surveillance systems in the world aren't in china. It's in britain. It's in the US How do you even measure that? I have no idea what you're are saying means?
- PricelessValue 9y ago
  > How do you even measure that? How about on a per capita basis? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/06/tony-porter-surveillance-commissioner-risk-cctv-public-transparent https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/06/tony-porter-su... Or how about 1. In terms of quality and sophistication tech. US and Britain pioneered most of the surveillance tech. 2. Experience and age? We have decades head start on the chinese when it comes to tech surveillance. 3. We are more "connected" and a more urban society with surveillable data? Nearly 50% of china still lives in rural areas.
  - kasey_junk 9y ago
    I don’t have a dog in this fight other than to note “nearly 50% of China” is a massive number.
  - rconti 9y ago
    So "leading surveillance systems in the world" means: 1. Who "started it" 2. How long they've been doing it 3. Percentage of people affected by it (not number!) In other words, you worked backwards to produce vague descriptions of metrics by which your point would be true. If it weren't for the fact that these vague metrics in no way support your assertion.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago

How much do you want to bet that a lot of these technologies are built on open source software? If it was a company that was licensing software to them, there would be someone to hold accountable, but with open source, you just make and release something and it is not your problem who uses it for what.

toomanybeersies 9y ago
This is the most bizarre argument against OSS that I've ever read.

gugudollz 9y ago

There has never been internet shutdown in Kenya. TV stations were switched off but never internet. If China establishes autocratic regimes in the global South it will seize those governments and leverage that to gain power over the West. It's myopic to think their goal is anything less than absolute domination of the world.

Barrin92 9y ago
It's probably safe to assume that China wants to increase its influence, but accusing any country of plans of 'absolute domination' based on domestic surveillance probably says more about the psyche of the accuser than anyone else
- gugudollz 9y ago
  The article talks about exporting the tech to the global South, not me. The goal not being in the export itself but in the subjugation of those people under a central point of capture. From there, it's obvious who remains: the West.
- woodandsteel 9y ago
  Where would you say China is trying to go in the long-term, internationally? I get the impression it wants to be the global hegemon, but perhaps I am wrong.
  - nickik 9y ago
    Based on what? What has China done in the last 40 years that would even close to imply that? There is still a part of China that is not even controlled by China (Taiwan). They are surrounded by lots of other powerful countries, Russia, India, Japan and so on. The US military is driving around right in front of them. They are getting accused of wanting global hegemony based on thing like building bases in the South China Sea. Something that other countries have done before China. Seems to me if anything China has behaved incredibly passive. Maybe in the back of their minds they have the idea that this strategy will lead to some kind of soft hegemony but that is just speculation based on nothing.

gcb0 9y ago

most people doesn't recognise that this is the "I don't have anything to hide"-folks wetest dream. this kind of article is just free advertisement for the companies selling this crap. even here, the top comment now is about how someone never felt safer in China, probably because they " have nothing to hide"

normayzer 9y ago

CCP: Chinese citizens are ready for democracy!

pentae 9y ago

So can anyone tell me why we should support what China is doing? Why should any entrepreneur or tech worker go there and support this government? How come China seems to get a free pass on human rights issues like this by western society?

yusuke10 9y ago
So the short answer is, don't support China. Long answer is - reduce buying stuff from China. - reduce buying stuff on aliexpress or alibaba or even amazon. try buying local - call out leaders and entrepreneurs on social media when they are acquiescing/favorable to China (Tim Cook, Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, etc) - try to start up manufacturing of hardwares in your city/state/country - call out China's totalitarianism in your circle of influence
- devwinportable 9y ago
  +1 especially with China backing North Korean regime publicly/privately
_cs2017_ 9y ago
Because keeping a large diverse country stable and safe is very difficult, and a failure causes enormous tragedy. The approach that works to keep the US stable does not always work well in other countries. To keep the billion people who live in China safe from civil war and rampant terrorism is already a great achievement -- even it comes at the expense of some nice things such as human rights. In fact, China manages to do more than just keep itself stable; it's actually improving economically. That state of affairs is a lot better than many, many countries can even dream about. A push for human rights increases the chance of a government collapse. That's what happened in the Soviet Russia during Gorbachev. It was everyone's luck that it resulted in relatively little suffering. A similar fall of the government in Syria, Yugoslavia, Iraq, etc were absolutely horrible for the people living in those countries. It is very hard to accept even a small risk of such an event in China; the suffering it would cause is beyond imagination. Therefore, many people are quite happy with the approach followed by the Chinese government. In fact, it gives many people a hope that China might become a little similar to Singapore. The Singapore government has some issues with human rights (of course, much more modest than China), but is still highly respected both inside and outside the country precisely due to the prosperity and safety it brought to people. Of course, for people who absolutely prioritize human rights, this is not good enough. But such people have relatively little influence outside the Western civilization. One certainly cannot blame people who prioritize the safety and prosperity of their family above human rights, and these people seem to be by far the majority of the Chinese population.

wrg91237 9y ago

Reason for surveillance. London and Paris may do the same if there are more attacks. "Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri released a statement supporting Jihad in Xinjiang against Chinese, in the Caucasus against the Russians and naming Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan as places of warfare.[42] Zawahiri endorsed "jihad to liberate every span of land of the Muslims that has been usurped and violated, from Kashgar to Andalusia, and from the Caucasus to Somalia and Central Africa".[43] Uyghurs inhabit Kashgar, the city which was mentioned by Zawahiri.[44]" They don't want moderation. "The Uyghur terrorist organization East Turkestan Islamic Movement's magazine Islamic Turkistan has accused the Chinese "Muslim Brotherhood" (the Yihewani) of being responsible for the moderation of Hui Muslims and the lack of Hui joining terrorist jihadist groups in addition to blaming other things for the lack of Hui Jihadists, such as the fact that for more than 300 years Hui and Uyghurs have been enemies of each other, no separatist Islamist organizations among the Hui, the fact that the Hui view China as their home, and the fact that the "infidel Chinese" language is the language of the Hui.[33][34]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_China#Xinjiang https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_China#Xinjiang "A 2016 study from New America, a Washington-based think tank, found 114 Uighurs from Xinjiang joined the Islamic State. Xinjiang furnished the highest number of foreign ISIS fighters from any one region of the world outside of Saudi Arabia and Tunisia, the study found." http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/01/the-islamic-state-pledged-to-attack-china-next-heres-why/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/01/the-islamic-state-pledge...

sctb 9y ago
You've been violating this guideline, could you please stop? > We ban accounts that use Hacker News primarily for political or ideological battle, regardless of which politics they favor. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

risent 9y ago

Freedom is not free. The majority of world are like peace, but the minority can break it with terrorist attacks. To prevent the attacks, the majority will pay a huge price. In the other way, the minority's attacks will create Nationalism in the majority, and this will make the attacks more worse. Is there any way to resolve this?

andrepd 9y ago
This is a false dillema. Show me any evidence that massive surveillance increases security. There are many things that increase peace and security: wealth, education, good institutions/political systems, arguably culture, etc. Surveillance is probably not one of them.
- risent 9y ago
  I agree with your opinion. But the problem is that: every option in your comment is a long term policy, it can't resolve the current problem in the reality as quick as possible.

thinkhard 9y ago

China does not give a fxxx. You do not feel the pain 'cause you are not the victim or relative/friend of the victim of the terror attack. What kind of human rights are taken away by PUBLIC surveillance?

Cw67NTN8F 9y ago

I am sure Dept X has plans ready, just waiting for the opportune moment to implement it in USA. To protect the children or something... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number-plate_recognition#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number-plate_recogni... Mobile ANPR is becoming a significant component of municipal predictive policing strategies and intelligence gathering, as well as for recovery of stolen vehicles, identification of wanted felons, and revenue collection from individuals who are delinquent on city or state taxes or fines, or monitoring for "Amber Alerts". With the widespread implementation of this technology, many U.S. states now issue misdemeanor citations of up to $500 when a license plate is identified as expired or on the incorrect vehicle. Successfully recognized plates may be matched against databases including "wanted person", "protection order", missing person, gang member, known and suspected terrorist, supervised release, immigration violator, and National Sex Offender lists. In addition to the real-time processing of license plate numbers, ANPR systems in the US collect (and can indefinitely store) data from each license plate capture. Images, dates, times and GPS coordinates can be stockpiled and can help place a suspect at a scene, aid in witness identification, pattern recognition or the tracking of individuals.

whisk 9y ago

I have read some stories during the year without Internet in Xinjiang. In fact people can still connect to local network then, they just disconnected the link from province level ISP to Internet. Some young mans built local websites provides movie, softwares downloads, news and bbs inside the LAN. They travels to nearest town outside Xinjiang every week by train, download new resources in net bar, bring them back in hard disk and update their websites. Nobody knows how long will the disconnection last and somebody prepared to maintain the LAN from long years. It makes me recall 20 years ago I access contents on Internet through CD-ROM in magazines. In the end, the Internet recovered and these websites soon disappeared.

deleted 9y ago
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themodelplumber 9y ago
Wow. I love hearing about the persistence under those conditions. Reminds me a bit of what I've heard of Cuba, a semi-sneakernet setup.
- girvo 9y ago
  It’s even cooler than that. In Havana, there’s a local network via Ethernet cables strung between buildings, that you can use hacked video game consoles to play against others on, among other things!
- rqs 9y ago
  I'm not local, but actually, there are many stories published by locals during that time, most of it are written in Chinese of course. You can still found some of it by googling keyword "新疆断网", and Google Translate them if you interested to read. In summary: In the first few days, people miss the access; Then, they built their own network, providing news, BBS, downloading and even online gaming services etc. If they had enough time, I could assume they will build a complete alternative of China's Internet, just like what happened in the China's Internet then the access to the true Internet is limited. But "enough time" is what they don't have, when the access been restored, most local websites are faded.

ChoGGi 9y ago

If an oppressive government can shut down internet access whenever they want, then it seems the real problem is losing paper news to digital. I'd say a decentralized mesh network is a step in the right direction, but if there's spyware on all the phones; that doesn't help as much.

fdsak 9y ago

"Western viewpoint" is creating more problems than solutions and behind that there is fear of capitalist losing business and control over world affairs. Its not human rights in China or anything else, if that was the case the recent wars in Middle East might not have erupted and have been diffused with much sense of urgency and political acumen than supplying arms to rebels and wipe-out humanity on their way of interests. Democracy, human rights and all these terms are just fancy words to get financial and political advantage over weaker countries or adversaries. We do not need to be all democratic nations or republics to prosper intellectually and spiritually or in any other domain.West and Western people should stop now teaching other countries about human rights and democracy after what we have seen on global stage.

deleted 9y ago
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drb91 9y ago
Conflating democracy and capitalism certainly is terrible. Capitalism is also terrible & responsible for recent wars, since the opium wars to my tally. Maybe earlier? The french-indian war?
- fdsak 9y ago
  Are they different now ? and to worst of our dreams they are now evolved to "imperialist" monster. They might look good in books only. I do not see any of them, see UN for example, the center for 21th century's humanity.
foxhill 9y ago
please, that’s not what this is about. this is an issue of individual liberty, and the freedom from oppression/being forced to live under someone else’s rules. these are desirable qualities for any self aware individual. no human, chinese or otherwise, wants to live without this concept of freedom.
- fdsak 9y ago

soueuls 9y ago

I have personally lived long term both in the US and China (I am French) And I would choose China to raise my kids over the US any days. Yes there are repression in China, it would be a lie to deny it, yes I have been around a girl who smoked weed, she was 28-30 years old and she literally had to hide behind a car because it's completely forbidden, highly punished and another citizen can report you. But China has many advantages, public services are awesome. Unlike France and the US, the government is corrupt but they don't vote any law against Chinese themselves. It's a country which still have some kind of moral traditions and values so far. And last but not least I prefer government's surveillance than people's surveillance. It's far more easier to free think in China than it is in the US and France. The latter countries are closer to the sesame credit than the latter.

rqs 9y ago
> Unlike France and the US, the government is corrupt but they don't vote any law against Chinese themselves It's not very logical. By definition, the word "Law" means: a system of rules that are created and enforced through social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior[0]. Who's behavior? Trees? Mountains? No, people's behavior, people who living inside the territory of the country. So, the right way to put should be: China's laws are more restrict towards foreigners, which is reasonable, because: 1) Foreigners contributes less to the society than locals in general. 2) Foreigners have no proxy or benefiter in the government system, so nobody will speak for them. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law
- Arn_Thor 9y ago
  I think the user you're responding to has it exactly backwards. Laws are more strictly applied to local Chinese than to tourists and expats. The general idea seems to be "these laowai are full of vices and they will do what they do, but we must instill and uphold a strict moral code for our own people to maintain a healthy society" (I'm of course speaking of petty law breaking such as smoking weed or jaywalking. If you steal or defraud someone you'll see your visa disappear faster than sin)
taway483 9y ago

chvid 9y ago

What the article is forgetting is the severity of the conflict with its potent mix of race, religion and by-gone nationality. To me the parallels to the Uyghurs in Xinjiang are the conflicts involving the Rohingyas in Myanmar, the "deep south" in Thailand, and maybe the "pirates" around Malaysia and Philippines. These conflicts are all being handled with far heavier hand than what China is doing in Xinjiang.

powerapple 9y ago

1) There was no hijab in Xinjiang before and now it is very common. 2) DARPA has many research grants on ughyur language.

EGreg 9y ago

You guys may be concerned about China today. However, in the long run, with AI the humans are building a zoo for themselves. When machines are able to complete every task better, win every strategic confrontation, and so on, there will not be any point for humans to make any significant contributions - including art. Even video and audio will be faked easily. When their every move can be scrutinized and next moves easily predicted, they can be easily caged and controlled. Raised to go along with anything, because "resistance is futile". The world is being turned into monocultures and farms. And humans are building a zoo for themselves. No one will really run the place in the end.

emanreus 9y ago
To add to the irony, we are the ones doing it.

zachguo 9y ago

Xinjiang is under surveillance for a reason. They have blown up buses and killed thousands. Crime rate among Uyghurs community is also much higher.

KozmoNau7 9y ago
I presume you have reliable sources for those claims?
- zachguo 9y ago
  I grew up in China. When I was little, there was a time that if a Uyghurs person get on the bus, everybody else on the bus would get off. Even nowadays people tend to get nervous when they see Uyghurs wandering on street.
  - eivarv 9y ago
    That doesn't necessarily mean it's reasonable to be suspicious towards an entire ethnic group. Not many Uyghurs support violence, and not all Uyghurs are separatists.
  - KozmoNau7 9y ago
    Replace "when I was little" with "1930s Germany" and "Uyghurs" with "Jews". A seed of distrust and paranoia was sown and was allowed to grow. That does not mean it has any basis in fact. You should also look at how the Chinese government has oppressed the Uyghurs (and Tibetans and Taiwanese, to name a few).
    - zachguo 9y ago
      I know biased stereotype is bad, and I totally agree not all Uyghurs are bad. I went to Uyghurs restaurant regularly and had Uyghurs classmates in college too.
      - pertymcpert 9y ago

dandare 9y ago

Without pointing a finger, I will say I would be really surprised if this discussion - and HN in general - was not subject to a discourse control by paid state agents (sophisticated trolls) from China and elsewhere. Assuming that it is, what can we learn or do to miting such influences? Asking for independent source to all claims is obviously the first step.

fdsak 9y ago
That is the real problem with the liberty now. And I think liberty is dead under the pile of fake news generated by various parties interested in any issue. From war on terror to democracy and nuclear weapons the "agents" as you called, generates such a perception that we cannot escape, let alone our psychological biases and national, political and religious affiliations -- Welcome to the age of disinformation
- stareatgoats 9y ago
  Whoa, that was a depressing stance. Whereas you point to several serious problems I would hope the absolutism is there for rhetoric reasons! Personally I think it may still be argued that the information age holds the potential for greater knowledge than ever before, and factual liberty (as opposed to seeming) is very much a part of that. It just may not come quite as easy and automatically as perhaps once perceived.
  - fdsak 9y ago
    Yes its depressing to see lot of dead people under the rug of so-called liberal journalism and we are siting on that rug and talking about democracy and how to remove a dictator because we dont like him etc etc. I do like the "literary" ideas (don't know if that right word) which does not work practically. I am more concerned about the livelihood of people (alive), democracy is not for dead people. I don't deny the benefits of information age, that is huge blessings for everyone. Probably it will take some time to reap the real benefits but I am afraid the cost is getting higher, as too much information/disinformation to filter out facts from fictions. And in most of the cases states and media agencies are part of that fiction and friction created in the society, take it China or US.

logicallee 9y ago

This seems as good an article as any to ask: in people's opinion here, is there any risk for Americans going to China and continuing normal Internet browsing activities? (I know the following is not the best attitude, but I really do mean on a "nothing to hide" basis.) Someone in this thread mentioned $4.7 billion (quoted as 30B RMB in this thread) on the security and surveillance, for just Xinjiang, which has a population of 21m give or take, out of China's 1.37 billion people. That's obviously a lot of money (for comparison the entire US intelligence budget is maybe an order of magnitude higher annually), so I'd assume that when in China, and maybe outside of it, basically whatever you do can/could be monitored. I get the impression that if you're not, I don't know, doing detailed dissident planning it's not an issue, so this would seem the same standard as pretty free Americans would expect. In America, yeah if you spend 18 months downloading textbooks on bombmaking, buying laboratory equipment on Amazon, and then eventually industrial sizes of fertilizer, ammonia, and remote demolition detonators on Ali Express, while getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bitcoin from seling a 1-page haircut ebook which has 1 review stating it was useless, while you spend most of your time travelling between Syria and Washington DC, where you're at home on the dark net all day over tor, reading arabic language anti-American calls for terrorism and jihad, you would expect to get a visit at some point between when you start that journey and when you're on skype bidding your mother back home goodbye, saying that you will die for a worthy cause in your Jihad against the U.S. imperialist pigs and asking for her bank account information. I mean sure everything I've just stated (literally the entirety of this paragraph) falls under freedom of expression, freedom of thinking, and freedom of commerce, but as a practical matter you'd expect to be stopped at some point. So is that the standard? If I go to Beijing but I'm not spending eighteen months travelling between Beijing and Taiwan reading about how to arm rebels for a military coup, how to get what you want by taking political hostages, and taking geographic survey equipment across the street from state buildings in Beijing with a notebook and a "Insurrection for Dummies: How to lead an armed rebellion and communicate with your followers while toppling Beijing's military hegemony" book, as an American could I expect to continue my normal Internet browsing (including reading or posting about "sensitive topics" or whatever)? I mean on an everyday basis. Note that my Chinese example didn't include purchasing fertilizer and detonators, so I get that the standard could be a bit lower - but does normal American online behavior count? Or would an American not be able to enjoy their usual online freedom without getting lots of problems?

devwinportable 9y ago

China's quite notorious for sending back North Korean defectors (and cooperating with NK spy agencies for this) this isn't going well...

sonnhy 9y ago

They talk about China yet still a few realize that we are as well going into that direction. CCTV are everywhere, Facebook and Google have our identities, what we like, what we look for, what will be our probable next move (also in terms of real world position) and our routines. If ever a Chinese that feel safe in his home comes to the outer world (to us) he would say "how could this nation is so undeveloped to not already have a better security likes us" and we would be amazed and reply how he does not, instead, feel so stalked in his state. But still, if we were to go on a third world nation we would ask the same and the local people would reply at us the same way as we did to the chinese.

fdsak 9y ago
I think Chinese are not that smart to use some fancy words like "freedom of speech" "democracy" "individual liberty" but still doing same things as all other is doing. The problem here is how some country builds narrative and justification around her actions. Digital age is double edge sword and everyone is going to bleed under the pretext of security.
- jonathanstrange 9y ago
  China is a one-party system in which the country is run by a single cadre of 'politicians'. There is corruption everywhere and there are Draconian laws which are applied selectively and sometimes enforced and sometimes not (e.g. half of all food stands in cities are illegal, riding motorbikes is illegal in many cities, etc.). Internet and phone calls are constantly monitored and filtered based on certain words to the extent that if you use a certain word even in a different and completely innocuous context your phone call is interrupted or your internet connection stops working. There are hundreds of political prisoners and laws are applied selectively based on your standing within the party. There are political re-education camps and critiques of the government are frequently arrested under bogus and clearly invented pretexts, are often often put under house arrest, and are constantly harassed and surveilled by all kinds of authorities. Public protests are persecuted as uprisings against the state, using various deliberately vague and overly broad laws. The idea that the differences between China and freer countries are merely a matter of the 'narrative' is patently ridiculous. It is also false, because according to the Chinese constitution, "...citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession, and of demonstration." So yes, China officially has the same narrative, it just doesn't have any due process, has massive surveillance not even remotely comparable to Western countries, and suffers from massive corruption in the hands of a single 'party'.

Synaesthesia 9y ago

What nobody wants is crushing poverty like in India, and Africa. I'm sure those peasants would consider life in China to be wonderful.