China is indeed aspiring to copy western countries surveillance state, and taking it much further, but you are overestimating the infrastructure and data sharin

China is indeed aspiring to copy western countries surveillance state, and taking it much further, but you are overestimating the infrastructure and data sharing already in place. The often discussed social credit system for example will start national operation soon, but in its absence, there is no national credit system. Ant Group was recently busted by regulators for not sharing credit data with the state [0] Facial recognition is very advanced in Xinjiang and first/second tier cities, but it is usually localized and data sharing between agencies seems very low. Life in China is full of legal grey zones, as is typical in developing countries, with things technically being not legal, but no one is there to enforce it. [0] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/23/ant-group-to-share-consumer-credit-data-with-chinas-central-bank.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/23/ant-group-to-share-consumer-...