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The UK is quickly deploying surveillance state technology that people once decried China for. Whether or not this is ethical or useful, I wish the hypocrisy wou

by Shank 1y ago

The UK is quickly deploying surveillance state technology that people once decried China for. Whether or not this is ethical or useful, I wish the hypocrisy would be acknowledged. The OSA, the Apple encryption demands, LFR, …, it’s clearly a trend. Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things?

buyucu 1y ago
Every accusation from the West towards China is an admission of guilt. It is called projection: accusing others of what you actually are doing.
elric 1y ago
They've been doing this for years at protests, using "Forward Intelligence Teams". Even back in 2010 [1] there was an action group trying to protest this growing police-state (Fitwatch). The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember. Must be a truly dangerous place... https://web.archive.org/web/20100824175032/http://fitwatch.org.uk/ https://web.archive.org/web/20100824175032/http://fitwatch.o...
- crimsoneer 1y ago
  The fact the UK police deploy teams with cameras to record crime is really not the dystopian hellscape Fitwatch like to make out it is.
- jon-wood 1y ago
  The CCTV cameras I've never really had a problem with - despite what TV shows and films would like to tell you they're not actually a single coherent CCTV network, a vast proportion of them are operated by random shopkeepers, private home owners, and other such places. If they want footage from them the police are typically going to have to send someone out to ask for it, and then hope they haven't reused the storage already. This sort of thing, deploying facial recognition systems in the street in the hope of finding someone, is much more insidious. Technically you can choose to bypass it, or pull something over your face, but that's more or less guaranteeing that you'll be stopped and questioned as to why you're concerned about it. Sadly the UK never met an authoritarian they didn't like (apart from Hitler, so long as you're not as bad as Hitler himself you're good though). When surveyed the British public will call for banning basically anything they don't like, even if it doesn't impact them at all.
  - DrBazza 1y ago
    There's no small irony that facial recognition isn't going to recognise the faces of those currently racing around on e-bikes stealing phones wearing their 'safety balaclavas'. Or, indeed, some of the more militant protesters that are turning up all over the place. It's a cliche, but if you have nothing to hide, and intend to protest peacefully, why are you covering your face?
    - tharmas 1y ago
      >if you have nothing to hide But it's not you that decides that what you are doing is harmless. It's what the authorities decide; and that can be quite different from what you or other people deem "nothing to hide".
    - dathinab 1y ago
      > It's a cliche, but if you have nothing to hide, and intend to protest peacefully, why are you covering your face? because who says the state (and the people acting for it, e.g. police) are always the good guys there is a VERY long history of people being systematically harassed and persecuted for things which really shouldn't be an issue, and might not have been illegal either (but then the moment a state becomes the bad guy "illegal" loses meaning as doing the ethical right thing might now be illegal) like just looking at the UK, they e.g. "thanked" Alan Turing for his war contributions by driving him into Suicide because he was gay or how people through history have been frequently harassed for "just" not agreeing with the currently political fraction in power, and I really mean just not agreeing not trying to do anything to change it and even if we ignore systematic stuff like that there has been also more then just a few cases of police officers abusing their power. Including cases like them stalking people, or them giving the address of people to radical groups, or blackmailing them for doing stuff which is legal but not publicly well perceived. (E.g. someone had sex with their wife on a balcony not visible from the street but visible from a surveillance camera). And even if nothing of this applies to you, if there is no privacy and mass surveillance this can also help people in power to frame you for something you didn't do. Like e.g. to make you lose your job so their brother in law can get it instead. and even ignoring all that you should have a right for privacy and since when is it okay to harass people which just want to defend their rights? anyway if you think is through "I have nothing to hide" is such a ridiculous dump argument.
- orra 1y ago
  > Must be a truly dangerous place... I don't know if you're awaee, but the number of arrests for terrorism has skyrocketed in recent months, in the UK. Sounds terrifying, until you realise people were arrested as terrorists for holding placards. (That fact is of course terrifying, but in a chilling way).
  - tharmas 1y ago
    Its Orwellian.
  - lambdas 1y ago
    I hope I’m not adding 2 + 2 to get 5, but it’s incredibly convenient that a lot of people are being charged for supporting a proscribed group the same month as the online safety act is rolled out… The cynic in me almost wonders if when it comes to re-election time, these increased numbers in terrorist charges will be trotted out and the context conveniently forgotten.
    - pydry 1y ago
      I dont think it really signifies anything more than there being a rather dim and unimaginative set of authoritarians in charge.
    - foldr 1y ago
      Terrorism hasn’t historically been an election issue in the UK, so this seems enormously unlikely.
  - pmarreck 1y ago
    It still arguably complies with the Paradox of Tolerance. Terrorists (as well as their supporters) are intolerant and non-pluralist. Therefore, for a pluralist society to survive, it must be intolerant of one thing- intolerance.
    - gregorygoc 1y ago
      It’s basic game theory. If someone is not nice to you, you have to be not nice for them.
- tonyedgecombe 1y ago
  >* The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember.* Per-capita it’s less than the US.
  - dylan604 1y ago
    But with the smaller space for the population, it's nearly total coverage from multiple angles vs the wide distances separating the equivalent number of cameras in the US.
    - machomaster 1y ago
      And generally people speak about London specifically and not about rural UK areas.
    - jansper39 1y ago
      The original figure included private CCTV systems which to all intents and purposes aren't available to government bodies without a warrant.
- gopher_space 1y ago
  Judge Dredd was an 80s reaction to this ethos. It’s old.
- sunshine-o 1y ago
  > The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember. By the way, do anybody care what would happen (at least psychologically) in case of a massive blackout or cyber-incident? Just imagine something akin to what happened to the Iberian peninsula a few months ago, the country goes into flame quickly preventing recovery and then it's on. Most of the systems the UK has to control its population are inoperable. I am pretty sure it is in the back of the mind of the UK leaders when they negotiate with Russia and China....
  - rkomorn 1y ago
    You think it would turn into an impromptu de facto purge (of The Purge fame)?
noqc 1y ago
The form of government matters a lot, when evaluating its security apparatus. I feel a lot differently about the death penalty in America than in Iran too.
- throawayonthe 1y ago
  that is very funny thank you
- saaaaaam 1y ago
  Are you American, Iranian, or some other?
lenerdenator 1y ago
Well, China got away with it. More than got away with it, actually... they prospered. There has to be an incentive to not do these things as a government. There is none in the UK.
- potato3732842 1y ago
  >There has to be an incentive to not do these things as a government. There is none in the UK. The only incentive governments ever have to not do bad shit is that the people will hate it so much that the government will wind up with less power than they started with. But, decisions are ultimately made by individuals or small groups of them who have interest (profit, legacy, etc) in doing what the people wand and what is good for the people. If enough people in government's personal interest is aligned with that of the people you get more outcomes that are aligned with the people.
  - lenerdenator 1y ago
    > The only incentive governments ever have to not do bad shit is that the people will hate it so much that the government will wind up with less power than they started with. Well, that's the trick, isn't it? You have to give people a way to reduce government's power if the government does something the people don't like, but do it in a way that keeps society from flying apart.
    - FridayoLeary 1y ago
      Guns are an answer to the first problem but not the second, which is why the claim that guns protect the people from tyranny is so wrong. The best solution i can think of is constantly seeking to reduce the government and limit it's power, size and responsibilities, always trimming the hedge. I.E. conservatism. Any government fundementally should be trusted and relied upon as little as possible, if you want to prevent abuses.
      - spaceribs 1y ago
        You're not describing conservatism, you're describing anarchism.
HPsquared 1y ago
Cynically, it's just another form of infrastructure we are behind the curve on.
fennecfoxy 1y ago
Suppose it depends on what it's used for. We could trust the government to be good, but governments are made from people, elected by people. And people are often shitbags to each other. For all the CCTV in London I've been mugged twice and nothing was captured on CCTV nor were the police all that interested in doing anything about it. As an outsider living here I think the UK has huge social problems that are neglected in favour of retaining classism. America has the same problems but at least it's more "ah, what can ya do about it huh" rather than "we are a perfect polite society British values bla bla".
- runsWphotons 1y ago
  I commented about this on another thread, and probably most around here disagree with my general point there, but this fact amazes me. We have gotten all this tech creating a surveillance state but then it isn't even used to give better policing. You will just get mugged on camera by someone with ten prior charges and then be ignored by police.
  - krapp 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - xnorswap 1y ago
      That's not true whatsoever for the UK, the police barely respond to shoplifting.
    - incone123 1y ago
      Not in Britain there isn't. We have constant retail theft and violence against staff and the Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley asking the public to do the crime fighting https://www.witneygazette.co.uk/news/25365950.thames-valley-police-commissioner-said-challenge-thieves/ https://www.witneygazette.co.uk/news/25365950.thames-valley-...
      - deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
righthand 1y ago
No the world is actually much much safer especially in these first world countries. However our society is now flooded with Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt campaigns that foreigners, terrorists, criminals, are out to get you. This creates the dellusion that all these security companies are here to help and protect us. Really it's just politicians handing out tax money to private corporations (cronyism) for no improvement to security or life. But at least you'll tell yourself you feel safer because of it. These disgusting corporations run by wealthy people want to make everything a TSA line, because they think you are cattle. It means everyone suffers and your 4th Amendment is taken away (in US).
- potato3732842 1y ago
  The fact that these people and corporations are successful as they are is a condemnation of a subset of the people in our society and the public policy that has been pushed at their behest. In the same way that moralizing karens create drug cartels rich off trafficking scared morons unable to think a few steps ahead create Peter Theils rich off building 1984.
- Ray20 1y ago
  > No the world is actually much much safer especially in these first world countries. Is that true, or first world just became older, not exactly safer?
MaxPock 1y ago
Whatever they accuse China of is always a projection.
- varispeed 1y ago
  At least China has manufacturing, jobs and thriving middle class.
  - miningape 1y ago
    I wouldn't be so sure about the jobs and thriving middle class.
varispeed 1y ago
It's a sign that Labour and Conservatives are worried they are about to lose power. They "fumbled" the economy by selling everything out to the highest bidder, created captive labour market cementing the class divide - free market only for big corporations. Now they have to protect it and themselves. They need to know what people are talking about. Paranoia gets bigger every year. They are addicted to money and power.
dathinab 1y ago
> The UK is quickly deploying surveillance state technology that people once decried China for. they always had been or at least tried, for decades by now, the only thing which had been holding them back was the EU frequently being like "no wtf UK, that is against human rights, EU law, etc." > Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? no, and it also has a long track record of not only marginally improving your crime statistics. And especially stuff like facial recognition vans are most times not used to protect citizens but to create lists for who attended demos and similar. Which is most useful for suppressing/harassing your citizens instead of protecting them.
- JFingleton 1y ago
  > EU frequently being like "no wtf UK, that is against human rights, EU law, etc." And yet they are still pushing [0] [0] https://edri.org/our-work/despite-warning-from-lawyers-eu-governments-push-for-mass-surveillance-of-our-digital-private-lives/ https://edri.org/our-work/despite-warning-from-lawyers-eu-go...
  - fao_ 1y ago
    It's almost like huge organizations built off the backs of many different parties working in tandem, will at times have contradictory aims.
    - zosima 1y ago
      In that case it would be nice to see any effort from EU against government surveillance. Sure GDPR and what not, but they're full of loopholes for allowing government to do what private parties are not.
      - ajsnigrutin 1y ago
        EU is trying to implemement chat control... again. That's their effort. https://stopchatcontrol.eu/ https://stopchatcontrol.eu/ It would be nice if we removed the security guards for politicans, and if they're not doing bad stuff, they have nothing to fear.
deleted 1y ago
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temporallobe 1y ago
Now I understand why Black Mirror is a British show.
- throwaway422432 1y ago
  And Britain was Airstrip One in 1984 with most of the scenes taking place in what would have been London. Orwell definitely considered it possible that they could go that way.
oliyoung 1y ago
Quickly? London is one of the most CCTV covered cities in the world, and has been since the 70s As shocking as this is, it's not _surprising_
- gerdesj 1y ago
  That probably is true by some measure. There are a lot of cameras in the UK - rather more than when I was a nipper! I'm 55 and pretty well travelled and I've noted similar levels of coverage in many EU countries and the US and CA and of course CN (to be fair, my experience of CN is only HK). I don't know why people get so whizzed up about London's CCTV coverage. For me the scariest area is the M42 south of Birmingham. Every few 100 yards there is a high level camera at height and lots of ANPR. It is quite a logical place to concentrate on. Look at a map of England - Brum is in the middle of England and the main roads run nearby. M1 from the southeast, M5 from the southwest, then M1 and M6 (takes over from M5) carry on to the northeast and west. My own house has six HD cameras with Frigate to co-ordinate, analyse and record. My Reolinks never get to see the internet! Four are on the garden and two watch the front door, one is the door bell. Now ... "since the '70s": I'm old enough to remember the seventies (I still have several mugs for the Queen's Silver Jubilee in 1977, when I was seven). Back then video (VHS) was not a thing, neither was CCTV. We had three TV channels FFS! A cutting edge TV camera at the time was a huge beast and certainly was not mounted on a building or street lamp. Are you a local?
  - nmstoker 1y ago
    Ah the Silver Jubilee Mugs, we had a grey one with that weird bumpy ceramic effect. Anyway, on the cameras you're spot on. I do wonder how much UK cameras are used though - like a microcosm of our national potential, the cameras have potential but how often are they really used: half are likely faulty, most have the person monitoring them on a tea break when something happens and it seems to need an extreme act of violence before they get used in earnest.
    - gerdesj 1y ago
      We lived in Manc in 1977 (Dad was a soldier and did a year at UMIST to get to Lt Col, family in tow). Then we buggered off to Germany (again). For a kiddie, I had an amazing life! We were posted to Cyprus too. Our Jub mugs were mostly transfer printed. We had coloured ones and ones with a sort of silvery monochrome effort. I'm not too sure that the meme that the UK is the most monitored nation in the world is too true. You probably remember 1984. I went to a jolly posh school in Devon (Wolborough Hill School, Newton Abbot) and we had to discuss 1984 in 1984. Do you feel too monitored? I suspect that monitoring is under-reported elsewhere.
tokai 1y ago
This public information poster is from 2002. https://live.staticflickr.com/2314/2171185463_92a40441ab_b.jpg https://live.staticflickr.com/2314/2171185463_92a40441ab_b.j... The Brits have been going full steam ahead for many decades.
protocolture 1y ago
People beat up the UK for their stance on this stuff all the time. >it’s clearly a trend. Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? No
bko 1y ago
> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? From the article: > Under the plans, 10 live facial recognition (LFR) vans will be used by seven forces across England to help identify "sex offenders or people wanted for the most serious crimes", according to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper. I guess it depends on how dangerous these criminals are. If there was someone offing kids randomly in my neighborhood, I wouldn't necessarily be against this technology. I think it would be good in schools, where we really should know exactly anyone entering the school. But of course there is a limit.
- lokar 1y ago
  I seriously doubt this would stand up to a rational cost benefit analysis. If the lives of children are so very valuable I’m sure there are many more effective and cheaper things they could be doing on a per-life basis.
- budududuroiu 1y ago
  “The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.” I’ll let you figure out who’s quote that is
  - subscribed 1y ago
    This is a manufactured, made up "quote". There's no such passage in the book you claim it comes from.
    - budududuroiu 1y ago
      Good to know
- laughing_man 1y ago
  I'd bet good money "sex offenders and people wanted for the most serious crimes" end up being just a tiny fraction of the use to which the systems are put to in practice. The age verification law was supposed to be protecting children from adult content, but on the very first day they used it to lock down video of political demonstrations.
golemiprague 1y ago
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Aeolun 1y ago
There's this movie [1], created like 20 years ago, that perfectly predicted this evolution of the UK. It's bizarre that it's turned out to be prophetic. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_Men https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_Men
- gizajob 1y ago
  Except that its main plot point was about infertility. And we’re not living in camps. And we haven’t gone feral with guns.
  - Aeolun 1y ago
    It's not 2027 yet!
somenameforme 1y ago
The first time I taught, it was a rather interesting experience realizing how little capacity teachers actually have to deal with e.g. a disruptive student. Yeah you can pass them along to the disciplinarian or whatever, but in the end it's often empty threats - especially if the parents themselves don't particularly care, which in the case of highly disruptive students is nearly always the case. But if a class itself, or even a significant minority of a class, simply chose to stop cooperating - there's not much of anything anyone could do about it. But when I went to school, I somehow felt like teachers had the power of the world behind them. I imagine, to some degree, politicians have a similar experience. There are countless people that wouldn't be upset at all about their decline, or worse. Of course this has always been the case, but I think modern politicians are becoming increasingly out of touch with society, and consequently also becoming increasingly paranoid about society turning against them. And society doesn't just mean you or me, but also the police and military, without the support of whom they'd just be some rich old frail men sitting around making lofty proclamations and empty threats. I think this issue largely explains the increasingly absurd degrees of apparent paranoia and fear of the political establishment in most countries. As well as the push for domestic establishment propaganda, censorship of anti-establishment propaganda, defacto mandating politics from a young age, imposing it on the police and even the military, and so forth.
- kombine 1y ago
  I was taking an intercity coach to Glasgow recently and a teenage kid was on his phone browsing social media without headphones. I made a comment that he should use headphones or turn the volume off. He got defensive and angry. I did not to escalate, and put my earplugs on. I do believe certain parcels of the society need to be restrained.
  - HKH2 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - iamflimflam1 1y ago
      The parent said teenager - race was not mentioned.
sneak 1y ago
The USA is doing the same, it’s just quieter.
dandanua 1y ago
> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? There is always a danger that the ruling class may not stay in power forever, unless the others are nailed to the ground.
crimsoneer 1y ago
It's worth recognising this is a very, very limited application of facial recognition, and miles away from what China deploys (or what's regularly used in the US)
SequoiaHope 1y ago
> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? No but the people have become so alienated and afraid as to demand it anyway.
- vixen99 1y ago
  Maybe that's true but there's also the down-stream effect of a persistent public voice telling us 'we should be ashamed of this country's (UK) past'. If accepted without examination, this view has rather obvious consequences as revealed in a poll from 2024 tt '17 per cent of British people would “willingly” fight for the UK in a war'. Other polls have found similar results. Why care about public order? https://www.thenational.scot/news/24076378.just-17-per-cent-people-willingly-fight-uk-poll-finds/ https://www.thenational.scot/news/24076378.just-17-per-cent-....
- pydry 1y ago
  There is barely any demand for this from the public and a fair bit of pushback. This is something the government is just trying to ram through regardless.
demarq 1y ago
Racism/ Sinophobia makes people think that there’s a Chinese surveillance and a western surveillance when in fact there is just surveillance. The media was the main culprit. When an article comes out they would use words that make one surveillance sound dystopian and the other sound vigilant. The end result is that surveillance in the west has been scoring small wins under the radar and what’s happening in the UK is the “breaking stealth” of a surveillance state. Had people just seen surveillance as surveillance none of this would have happened.
- throw10920 1y ago
  > Racism/ Sinophobia Factually, objectively false. Nobody thinks of Taiwan as having a surveillance state (or being evil along other axes), yet they're overwhelmingly (95%) Han Chinese - which is more Han Chinese than China itself. If there was any racism in these opinions whatsoever, then the people making statements about the PRC surveillance state would project the same beliefs onto Taiwan. That they don't is more than enough to prove your blatant lie completely false. The fact is that the Chinese surveillance is just factually different than western surveillance and people are acknowledging this as true, to the point where people like you have to lie about racism to emotionally manipulate people because they can't argue their points from reality. Making up falsehoods out of thin air is bad enough, but next time you do it, you'll save yourself personal embarrassment if the lie is at least somewhat plausible instead of dismissable with a 30-second trip to the internet.
ManBeardPc 1y ago
No it hasn’t become so dangerous and surveillance doesn’t help. Neither cameras nor real-name accounts actually helped to prevent crimes. Same with databases, lists or other surveillance tools. Many criminals who committed terrorism were known to the police before and they chose not to act or processes were not in place. All it does is lead to less freedom and security. The government itself is the security threat. There are always black sheep working there. They sell private details, enforce their own agenda or fail to secure sensitive information. Also extreme political parties can and did/will use it to silence undesired persons. Ask anyone who knows a bit of German history for many good examples.
- AlecSchueler 1y ago
  > Many criminals who committed terrorism were known to the police before and they chose not to act or processes were not in place In the case of the UK they've often also been operating in collusion with state forces, see: Northern Ireland.
  - twelvedogs 1y ago
    it's always easier to get funding if there's a threat
sharperguy 1y ago
If you oppose it then the right will say you support criminals and illegal immigrants and the left will say you harbor racist desires to express hatred under the guise of free speech and privacy.
TacticalCoder 1y ago
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rock_artist 1y ago
> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? Rather than dangeours, society became dumber in a sense. overload of data resulted attemps to summarize or even make anything binary (I'm Pro X or Anti X). (the text below is opinionated so please be forgiving :) ) I can name multiple countries (as I'm coming from one) that makes more "reforms" that has or will hurt human rights. (and we're still talking only on the "western world" which suppose to aim for freedom and human rights). Coming from such a complex place in the world, I sadly say, that looking at stages in my life, I can easily remember the "good'ol'days" where there was one horrible thing, but I didn't know it can get worse. I do hope society (and brits in the context of the above), will find the right balance to make a balance between feeling secured and invading privacy.
lemoncookiechip 1y ago
>Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? Over the last hundred years, violent crime has droped sharply worldwide. Over the last twenty years, it has fallen alot in developed countries such as Western Europe, North America, Japan and South Korea. In the United Kingdom, both violent and property crime have gone down in the past two decades. The main exception is fraud, scams and cybercrime, which have increased. Overall, crime, especially violent crime, is far lower now than it used to be. So why does it not feel that way? Mostly because we are floded with news about every incident. It sticks in our heads and makes us beleive things are worse than they are. It is like air travel: whenever there is a major crash, the headlines fill up with every minor incident, even though flying has never been safer than it is today. This is less about criminality and more about control. There's definitely an argument to be made that things have gotten safer because we have more surveillance, but that argument also has many valid counter-arguments, and giving away your freedom for absolute law and order isn't the way to go in my opinion, especially when you use narratives like "crime in DC is at an all time high" like we've seen in the USA lately which is false. https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/violent-crime-dc-hits-30-year-low https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/violent-crime-dc-hits-30-... A balance of surveillance and freedom is necessary for a healthy society. (By surveillance in this context, I mean simple things like CCTVs, police patrols, not necessarily drag-nets, face rec, whatever mind you).
- fakedang 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - stuaxo 1y ago
    That's been the biggest thing in the news for years now.
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
- bboygravity 1y ago
  Yeah, I mean if the UK is covering up and not counting 1000's of underaged girls being raped (with some police literally participating in the rape) the statistics are bound to look better than they are in reality. Having said that, I don't think the surveillance state they're setting up even has the intent to change any of that.
forgotoldacc 1y ago
In some ways, it's far exceeded China. China is strict with people rioting or complaining a little too much about the government, but they don't lock people up for saying general no no words or being too patriotic/nationalistic online. And apparently Chinese courts even limited facial recognition (no clue how it'll work in practice though). [1] [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-says-facial-recognition-should-not-be-forced-individuals-2025-03-21/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-says-facial-recogni...
- VHRanger 1y ago
  > China is strict with people rioting or complaining a little too much about the government, but they don't lock people up for saying general no no words or being too patriotic/nationalistic online. How absurd is this statement. China jails and disappears people for online statements at a rate several orders of magnitude larger than any western country. It's borderline ridiculous to even make a comparison. Some quick examples: 1. https://thediplomat.com/2025/03/chinas-system-of-mass-arbitrary-detention/ https://thediplomat.com/2025/03/chinas-system-of-mass-arbitr... 2. https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/28/china/hong-kong-security-arrests-hnk-intl/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/28/china/hong-kong-security-arre... You can get arrested for "picking quarrels" online: 3. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3146188/picking-quarrels-and-provoking-trouble-how-chinas-catch-all https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3146188/pic...
  - forgotoldacc 1y ago
    Picking quarrels is a crime in the UK too and people get sentenced for it. [1] The only difference is people will say "actually that's good" when the UK does it, but it's for some reason bad when China does the same exact stuff. According to the UK gov, they're arresting 30 people a day for it. [2] That's nearly 8000 people a year for what they say online. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr548zdmz3jo.amp https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr548zdmz3jo.amp [2] https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807CB70-D90D-4A19-9433-99539B7CF21F/OnlineCommunicationOffenceArrests https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807C...
- 1y ago
mihaaly 1y ago
Usually it is more about the weakness and incapacity of the authorities that are unable to carry out their job well, or several times they are lazy to perform difficult and tedious tasks, so they put limits on everyone instead, making everyone suspect, just to catch those very very few cases, that they are increasingly unable to.
mrkramer 1y ago
I often compare China to the British empire: ruthless autocratic capitalistic dictatorship.

by Shank 1y ago

buyucu 1y ago

Every accusation from the West towards China is an admission of guilt. It is called projection: accusing others of what you actually are doing.

elric 1y ago

They've been doing this for years at protests, using "Forward Intelligence Teams". Even back in 2010 [1] there was an action group trying to protest this growing police-state (Fitwatch). The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember. Must be a truly dangerous place... https://web.archive.org/web/20100824175032/http://fitwatch.org.uk/ https://web.archive.org/web/20100824175032/http://fitwatch.o...

crimsoneer 1y ago
The fact the UK police deploy teams with cameras to record crime is really not the dystopian hellscape Fitwatch like to make out it is.
jon-wood 1y ago
The CCTV cameras I've never really had a problem with - despite what TV shows and films would like to tell you they're not actually a single coherent CCTV network, a vast proportion of them are operated by random shopkeepers, private home owners, and other such places. If they want footage from them the police are typically going to have to send someone out to ask for it, and then hope they haven't reused the storage already. This sort of thing, deploying facial recognition systems in the street in the hope of finding someone, is much more insidious. Technically you can choose to bypass it, or pull something over your face, but that's more or less guaranteeing that you'll be stopped and questioned as to why you're concerned about it. Sadly the UK never met an authoritarian they didn't like (apart from Hitler, so long as you're not as bad as Hitler himself you're good though). When surveyed the British public will call for banning basically anything they don't like, even if it doesn't impact them at all.
- DrBazza 1y ago
  There's no small irony that facial recognition isn't going to recognise the faces of those currently racing around on e-bikes stealing phones wearing their 'safety balaclavas'. Or, indeed, some of the more militant protesters that are turning up all over the place. It's a cliche, but if you have nothing to hide, and intend to protest peacefully, why are you covering your face?
  - tharmas 1y ago
    >if you have nothing to hide But it's not you that decides that what you are doing is harmless. It's what the authorities decide; and that can be quite different from what you or other people deem "nothing to hide".
  - dathinab 1y ago
    > It's a cliche, but if you have nothing to hide, and intend to protest peacefully, why are you covering your face? because who says the state (and the people acting for it, e.g. police) are always the good guys there is a VERY long history of people being systematically harassed and persecuted for things which really shouldn't be an issue, and might not have been illegal either (but then the moment a state becomes the bad guy "illegal" loses meaning as doing the ethical right thing might now be illegal) like just looking at the UK, they e.g. "thanked" Alan Turing for his war contributions by driving him into Suicide because he was gay or how people through history have been frequently harassed for "just" not agreeing with the currently political fraction in power, and I really mean just not agreeing not trying to do anything to change it and even if we ignore systematic stuff like that there has been also more then just a few cases of police officers abusing their power. Including cases like them stalking people, or them giving the address of people to radical groups, or blackmailing them for doing stuff which is legal but not publicly well perceived. (E.g. someone had sex with their wife on a balcony not visible from the street but visible from a surveillance camera). And even if nothing of this applies to you, if there is no privacy and mass surveillance this can also help people in power to frame you for something you didn't do. Like e.g. to make you lose your job so their brother in law can get it instead. and even ignoring all that you should have a right for privacy and since when is it okay to harass people which just want to defend their rights? anyway if you think is through "I have nothing to hide" is such a ridiculous dump argument.
orra 1y ago
> Must be a truly dangerous place... I don't know if you're awaee, but the number of arrests for terrorism has skyrocketed in recent months, in the UK. Sounds terrifying, until you realise people were arrested as terrorists for holding placards. (That fact is of course terrifying, but in a chilling way).
- tharmas 1y ago
  Its Orwellian.
- lambdas 1y ago
  I hope I’m not adding 2 + 2 to get 5, but it’s incredibly convenient that a lot of people are being charged for supporting a proscribed group the same month as the online safety act is rolled out… The cynic in me almost wonders if when it comes to re-election time, these increased numbers in terrorist charges will be trotted out and the context conveniently forgotten.
  - pydry 1y ago
    I dont think it really signifies anything more than there being a rather dim and unimaginative set of authoritarians in charge.
  - foldr 1y ago
    Terrorism hasn’t historically been an election issue in the UK, so this seems enormously unlikely.
- pmarreck 1y ago
  It still arguably complies with the Paradox of Tolerance. Terrorists (as well as their supporters) are intolerant and non-pluralist. Therefore, for a pluralist society to survive, it must be intolerant of one thing- intolerance.
  - gregorygoc 1y ago
    It’s basic game theory. If someone is not nice to you, you have to be not nice for them.
tonyedgecombe 1y ago
>* The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember.* Per-capita it’s less than the US.
- dylan604 1y ago
  But with the smaller space for the population, it's nearly total coverage from multiple angles vs the wide distances separating the equivalent number of cameras in the US.
  - machomaster 1y ago
    And generally people speak about London specifically and not about rural UK areas.
  - jansper39 1y ago
    The original figure included private CCTV systems which to all intents and purposes aren't available to government bodies without a warrant.
gopher_space 1y ago
Judge Dredd was an 80s reaction to this ethos. It’s old.
sunshine-o 1y ago
> The UK has had an insane number of CCTV cameras for as long as I can remember. By the way, do anybody care what would happen (at least psychologically) in case of a massive blackout or cyber-incident? Just imagine something akin to what happened to the Iberian peninsula a few months ago, the country goes into flame quickly preventing recovery and then it's on. Most of the systems the UK has to control its population are inoperable. I am pretty sure it is in the back of the mind of the UK leaders when they negotiate with Russia and China....
- rkomorn 1y ago
  You think it would turn into an impromptu de facto purge (of The Purge fame)?

noqc 1y ago

The form of government matters a lot, when evaluating its security apparatus. I feel a lot differently about the death penalty in America than in Iran too.

throawayonthe 1y ago
that is very funny thank you
saaaaaam 1y ago
Are you American, Iranian, or some other?

lenerdenator 1y ago

Well, China got away with it. More than got away with it, actually... they prospered. There has to be an incentive to not do these things as a government. There is none in the UK.

potato3732842 1y ago
>There has to be an incentive to not do these things as a government. There is none in the UK. The only incentive governments ever have to not do bad shit is that the people will hate it so much that the government will wind up with less power than they started with. But, decisions are ultimately made by individuals or small groups of them who have interest (profit, legacy, etc) in doing what the people wand and what is good for the people. If enough people in government's personal interest is aligned with that of the people you get more outcomes that are aligned with the people.
- lenerdenator 1y ago
  > The only incentive governments ever have to not do bad shit is that the people will hate it so much that the government will wind up with less power than they started with. Well, that's the trick, isn't it? You have to give people a way to reduce government's power if the government does something the people don't like, but do it in a way that keeps society from flying apart.
  - FridayoLeary 1y ago
    Guns are an answer to the first problem but not the second, which is why the claim that guns protect the people from tyranny is so wrong. The best solution i can think of is constantly seeking to reduce the government and limit it's power, size and responsibilities, always trimming the hedge. I.E. conservatism. Any government fundementally should be trusted and relied upon as little as possible, if you want to prevent abuses.
    - spaceribs 1y ago
      You're not describing conservatism, you're describing anarchism.

HPsquared 1y ago

Cynically, it's just another form of infrastructure we are behind the curve on.

fennecfoxy 1y ago

Suppose it depends on what it's used for. We could trust the government to be good, but governments are made from people, elected by people. And people are often shitbags to each other. For all the CCTV in London I've been mugged twice and nothing was captured on CCTV nor were the police all that interested in doing anything about it. As an outsider living here I think the UK has huge social problems that are neglected in favour of retaining classism. America has the same problems but at least it's more "ah, what can ya do about it huh" rather than "we are a perfect polite society British values bla bla".

runsWphotons 1y ago
I commented about this on another thread, and probably most around here disagree with my general point there, but this fact amazes me. We have gotten all this tech creating a surveillance state but then it isn't even used to give better policing. You will just get mugged on camera by someone with ten prior charges and then be ignored by police.
- krapp 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - xnorswap 1y ago
    That's not true whatsoever for the UK, the police barely respond to shoplifting.
  - incone123 1y ago
    Not in Britain there isn't. We have constant retail theft and violence against staff and the Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley asking the public to do the crime fighting https://www.witneygazette.co.uk/news/25365950.thames-valley-police-commissioner-said-challenge-thieves/ https://www.witneygazette.co.uk/news/25365950.thames-valley-...
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]

righthand 1y ago

No the world is actually much much safer especially in these first world countries. However our society is now flooded with Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt campaigns that foreigners, terrorists, criminals, are out to get you. This creates the dellusion that all these security companies are here to help and protect us. Really it's just politicians handing out tax money to private corporations (cronyism) for no improvement to security or life. But at least you'll tell yourself you feel safer because of it. These disgusting corporations run by wealthy people want to make everything a TSA line, because they think you are cattle. It means everyone suffers and your 4th Amendment is taken away (in US).

potato3732842 1y ago
The fact that these people and corporations are successful as they are is a condemnation of a subset of the people in our society and the public policy that has been pushed at their behest. In the same way that moralizing karens create drug cartels rich off trafficking scared morons unable to think a few steps ahead create Peter Theils rich off building 1984.
Ray20 1y ago
> No the world is actually much much safer especially in these first world countries. Is that true, or first world just became older, not exactly safer?

MaxPock 1y ago

Whatever they accuse China of is always a projection.

varispeed 1y ago
At least China has manufacturing, jobs and thriving middle class.
- miningape 1y ago
  I wouldn't be so sure about the jobs and thriving middle class.

varispeed 1y ago

It's a sign that Labour and Conservatives are worried they are about to lose power. They "fumbled" the economy by selling everything out to the highest bidder, created captive labour market cementing the class divide - free market only for big corporations. Now they have to protect it and themselves. They need to know what people are talking about. Paranoia gets bigger every year. They are addicted to money and power.

dathinab 1y ago

> The UK is quickly deploying surveillance state technology that people once decried China for. they always had been or at least tried, for decades by now, the only thing which had been holding them back was the EU frequently being like "no wtf UK, that is against human rights, EU law, etc." > Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? no, and it also has a long track record of not only marginally improving your crime statistics. And especially stuff like facial recognition vans are most times not used to protect citizens but to create lists for who attended demos and similar. Which is most useful for suppressing/harassing your citizens instead of protecting them.

JFingleton 1y ago
> EU frequently being like "no wtf UK, that is against human rights, EU law, etc." And yet they are still pushing [0] [0] https://edri.org/our-work/despite-warning-from-lawyers-eu-governments-push-for-mass-surveillance-of-our-digital-private-lives/ https://edri.org/our-work/despite-warning-from-lawyers-eu-go...
- fao_ 1y ago
  It's almost like huge organizations built off the backs of many different parties working in tandem, will at times have contradictory aims.
  - zosima 1y ago
    In that case it would be nice to see any effort from EU against government surveillance. Sure GDPR and what not, but they're full of loopholes for allowing government to do what private parties are not.
    - ajsnigrutin 1y ago
      EU is trying to implemement chat control... again. That's their effort. https://stopchatcontrol.eu/ https://stopchatcontrol.eu/ It would be nice if we removed the security guards for politicans, and if they're not doing bad stuff, they have nothing to fear.

deleted 1y ago

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temporallobe 1y ago

Now I understand why Black Mirror is a British show.

throwaway422432 1y ago
And Britain was Airstrip One in 1984 with most of the scenes taking place in what would have been London. Orwell definitely considered it possible that they could go that way.

oliyoung 1y ago

Quickly? London is one of the most CCTV covered cities in the world, and has been since the 70s As shocking as this is, it's not _surprising_

gerdesj 1y ago
That probably is true by some measure. There are a lot of cameras in the UK - rather more than when I was a nipper! I'm 55 and pretty well travelled and I've noted similar levels of coverage in many EU countries and the US and CA and of course CN (to be fair, my experience of CN is only HK). I don't know why people get so whizzed up about London's CCTV coverage. For me the scariest area is the M42 south of Birmingham. Every few 100 yards there is a high level camera at height and lots of ANPR. It is quite a logical place to concentrate on. Look at a map of England - Brum is in the middle of England and the main roads run nearby. M1 from the southeast, M5 from the southwest, then M1 and M6 (takes over from M5) carry on to the northeast and west. My own house has six HD cameras with Frigate to co-ordinate, analyse and record. My Reolinks never get to see the internet! Four are on the garden and two watch the front door, one is the door bell. Now ... "since the '70s": I'm old enough to remember the seventies (I still have several mugs for the Queen's Silver Jubilee in 1977, when I was seven). Back then video (VHS) was not a thing, neither was CCTV. We had three TV channels FFS! A cutting edge TV camera at the time was a huge beast and certainly was not mounted on a building or street lamp. Are you a local?
- nmstoker 1y ago
  Ah the Silver Jubilee Mugs, we had a grey one with that weird bumpy ceramic effect. Anyway, on the cameras you're spot on. I do wonder how much UK cameras are used though - like a microcosm of our national potential, the cameras have potential but how often are they really used: half are likely faulty, most have the person monitoring them on a tea break when something happens and it seems to need an extreme act of violence before they get used in earnest.
  - gerdesj 1y ago
    We lived in Manc in 1977 (Dad was a soldier and did a year at UMIST to get to Lt Col, family in tow). Then we buggered off to Germany (again). For a kiddie, I had an amazing life! We were posted to Cyprus too. Our Jub mugs were mostly transfer printed. We had coloured ones and ones with a sort of silvery monochrome effort. I'm not too sure that the meme that the UK is the most monitored nation in the world is too true. You probably remember 1984. I went to a jolly posh school in Devon (Wolborough Hill School, Newton Abbot) and we had to discuss 1984 in 1984. Do you feel too monitored? I suspect that monitoring is under-reported elsewhere.

tokai 1y ago

This public information poster is from 2002. https://live.staticflickr.com/2314/2171185463_92a40441ab_b.jpg https://live.staticflickr.com/2314/2171185463_92a40441ab_b.j... The Brits have been going full steam ahead for many decades.

protocolture 1y ago

People beat up the UK for their stance on this stuff all the time. >it’s clearly a trend. Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? No

bko 1y ago

> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? From the article: > Under the plans, 10 live facial recognition (LFR) vans will be used by seven forces across England to help identify "sex offenders or people wanted for the most serious crimes", according to Home Secretary Yvette Cooper. I guess it depends on how dangerous these criminals are. If there was someone offing kids randomly in my neighborhood, I wouldn't necessarily be against this technology. I think it would be good in schools, where we really should know exactly anyone entering the school. But of course there is a limit.

lokar 1y ago
I seriously doubt this would stand up to a rational cost benefit analysis. If the lives of children are so very valuable I’m sure there are many more effective and cheaper things they could be doing on a per-life basis.
budududuroiu 1y ago
“The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.” I’ll let you figure out who’s quote that is
- subscribed 1y ago
  This is a manufactured, made up "quote". There's no such passage in the book you claim it comes from.
  - budududuroiu 1y ago
    Good to know
laughing_man 1y ago
I'd bet good money "sex offenders and people wanted for the most serious crimes" end up being just a tiny fraction of the use to which the systems are put to in practice. The age verification law was supposed to be protecting children from adult content, but on the very first day they used it to lock down video of political demonstrations.

golemiprague 1y ago

[dead]

Aeolun 1y ago

There's this movie [1], created like 20 years ago, that perfectly predicted this evolution of the UK. It's bizarre that it's turned out to be prophetic. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_Men https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_of_Men

gizajob 1y ago
Except that its main plot point was about infertility. And we’re not living in camps. And we haven’t gone feral with guns.
- Aeolun 1y ago
  It's not 2027 yet!

somenameforme 1y ago

The first time I taught, it was a rather interesting experience realizing how little capacity teachers actually have to deal with e.g. a disruptive student. Yeah you can pass them along to the disciplinarian or whatever, but in the end it's often empty threats - especially if the parents themselves don't particularly care, which in the case of highly disruptive students is nearly always the case. But if a class itself, or even a significant minority of a class, simply chose to stop cooperating - there's not much of anything anyone could do about it. But when I went to school, I somehow felt like teachers had the power of the world behind them. I imagine, to some degree, politicians have a similar experience. There are countless people that wouldn't be upset at all about their decline, or worse. Of course this has always been the case, but I think modern politicians are becoming increasingly out of touch with society, and consequently also becoming increasingly paranoid about society turning against them. And society doesn't just mean you or me, but also the police and military, without the support of whom they'd just be some rich old frail men sitting around making lofty proclamations and empty threats. I think this issue largely explains the increasingly absurd degrees of apparent paranoia and fear of the political establishment in most countries. As well as the push for domestic establishment propaganda, censorship of anti-establishment propaganda, defacto mandating politics from a young age, imposing it on the police and even the military, and so forth.

kombine 1y ago
I was taking an intercity coach to Glasgow recently and a teenage kid was on his phone browsing social media without headphones. I made a comment that he should use headphones or turn the volume off. He got defensive and angry. I did not to escalate, and put my earplugs on. I do believe certain parcels of the society need to be restrained.
- HKH2 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - iamflimflam1 1y ago
    The parent said teenager - race was not mentioned.

sneak 1y ago

The USA is doing the same, it’s just quieter.

dandanua 1y ago

> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? There is always a danger that the ruling class may not stay in power forever, unless the others are nailed to the ground.

crimsoneer 1y ago

It's worth recognising this is a very, very limited application of facial recognition, and miles away from what China deploys (or what's regularly used in the US)

SequoiaHope 1y ago

> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? No but the people have become so alienated and afraid as to demand it anyway.

vixen99 1y ago
Maybe that's true but there's also the down-stream effect of a persistent public voice telling us 'we should be ashamed of this country's (UK) past'. If accepted without examination, this view has rather obvious consequences as revealed in a poll from 2024 tt '17 per cent of British people would “willingly” fight for the UK in a war'. Other polls have found similar results. Why care about public order? https://www.thenational.scot/news/24076378.just-17-per-cent-people-willingly-fight-uk-poll-finds/ https://www.thenational.scot/news/24076378.just-17-per-cent-....
pydry 1y ago
There is barely any demand for this from the public and a fair bit of pushback. This is something the government is just trying to ram through regardless.

demarq 1y ago

Racism/ Sinophobia makes people think that there’s a Chinese surveillance and a western surveillance when in fact there is just surveillance. The media was the main culprit. When an article comes out they would use words that make one surveillance sound dystopian and the other sound vigilant. The end result is that surveillance in the west has been scoring small wins under the radar and what’s happening in the UK is the “breaking stealth” of a surveillance state. Had people just seen surveillance as surveillance none of this would have happened.

throw10920 1y ago
> Racism/ Sinophobia Factually, objectively false. Nobody thinks of Taiwan as having a surveillance state (or being evil along other axes), yet they're overwhelmingly (95%) Han Chinese - which is more Han Chinese than China itself. If there was any racism in these opinions whatsoever, then the people making statements about the PRC surveillance state would project the same beliefs onto Taiwan. That they don't is more than enough to prove your blatant lie completely false. The fact is that the Chinese surveillance is just factually different than western surveillance and people are acknowledging this as true, to the point where people like you have to lie about racism to emotionally manipulate people because they can't argue their points from reality. Making up falsehoods out of thin air is bad enough, but next time you do it, you'll save yourself personal embarrassment if the lie is at least somewhat plausible instead of dismissable with a 30-second trip to the internet.

ManBeardPc 1y ago

No it hasn’t become so dangerous and surveillance doesn’t help. Neither cameras nor real-name accounts actually helped to prevent crimes. Same with databases, lists or other surveillance tools. Many criminals who committed terrorism were known to the police before and they chose not to act or processes were not in place. All it does is lead to less freedom and security. The government itself is the security threat. There are always black sheep working there. They sell private details, enforce their own agenda or fail to secure sensitive information. Also extreme political parties can and did/will use it to silence undesired persons. Ask anyone who knows a bit of German history for many good examples.

AlecSchueler 1y ago
> Many criminals who committed terrorism were known to the police before and they chose not to act or processes were not in place In the case of the UK they've often also been operating in collusion with state forces, see: Northern Ireland.
- twelvedogs 1y ago
  it's always easier to get funding if there's a threat

sharperguy 1y ago

If you oppose it then the right will say you support criminals and illegal immigrants and the left will say you harbor racist desires to express hatred under the guise of free speech and privacy.

TacticalCoder 1y ago

[dead]

rock_artist 1y ago

> Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? Rather than dangeours, society became dumber in a sense. overload of data resulted attemps to summarize or even make anything binary (I'm Pro X or Anti X). (the text below is opinionated so please be forgiving :) ) I can name multiple countries (as I'm coming from one) that makes more "reforms" that has or will hurt human rights. (and we're still talking only on the "western world" which suppose to aim for freedom and human rights). Coming from such a complex place in the world, I sadly say, that looking at stages in my life, I can easily remember the "good'ol'days" where there was one horrible thing, but I didn't know it can get worse. I do hope society (and brits in the context of the above), will find the right balance to make a balance between feeling secured and invading privacy.

lemoncookiechip 1y ago

>Has society really become this dangerous that we must deploy these things? Over the last hundred years, violent crime has droped sharply worldwide. Over the last twenty years, it has fallen alot in developed countries such as Western Europe, North America, Japan and South Korea. In the United Kingdom, both violent and property crime have gone down in the past two decades. The main exception is fraud, scams and cybercrime, which have increased. Overall, crime, especially violent crime, is far lower now than it used to be. So why does it not feel that way? Mostly because we are floded with news about every incident. It sticks in our heads and makes us beleive things are worse than they are. It is like air travel: whenever there is a major crash, the headlines fill up with every minor incident, even though flying has never been safer than it is today. This is less about criminality and more about control. There's definitely an argument to be made that things have gotten safer because we have more surveillance, but that argument also has many valid counter-arguments, and giving away your freedom for absolute law and order isn't the way to go in my opinion, especially when you use narratives like "crime in DC is at an all time high" like we've seen in the USA lately which is false. https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/violent-crime-dc-hits-30-year-low https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/violent-crime-dc-hits-30-... A balance of surveillance and freedom is necessary for a healthy society. (By surveillance in this context, I mean simple things like CCTVs, police patrols, not necessarily drag-nets, face rec, whatever mind you).

fakedang 1y ago
[flagged]
- stuaxo 1y ago
  That's been the biggest thing in the news for years now.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
bboygravity 1y ago
Yeah, I mean if the UK is covering up and not counting 1000's of underaged girls being raped (with some police literally participating in the rape) the statistics are bound to look better than they are in reality. Having said that, I don't think the surveillance state they're setting up even has the intent to change any of that.

forgotoldacc 1y ago

In some ways, it's far exceeded China. China is strict with people rioting or complaining a little too much about the government, but they don't lock people up for saying general no no words or being too patriotic/nationalistic online. And apparently Chinese courts even limited facial recognition (no clue how it'll work in practice though). [1] [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-says-facial-recognition-should-not-be-forced-individuals-2025-03-21/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/china-says-facial-recogni...

VHRanger 1y ago
> China is strict with people rioting or complaining a little too much about the government, but they don't lock people up for saying general no no words or being too patriotic/nationalistic online. How absurd is this statement. China jails and disappears people for online statements at a rate several orders of magnitude larger than any western country. It's borderline ridiculous to even make a comparison. Some quick examples: 1. https://thediplomat.com/2025/03/chinas-system-of-mass-arbitrary-detention/ https://thediplomat.com/2025/03/chinas-system-of-mass-arbitr... 2. https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/28/china/hong-kong-security-arrests-hnk-intl/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/28/china/hong-kong-security-arre... You can get arrested for "picking quarrels" online: 3. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3146188/picking-quarrels-and-provoking-trouble-how-chinas-catch-all https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3146188/pic...
- forgotoldacc 1y ago
  Picking quarrels is a crime in the UK too and people get sentenced for it. [1] The only difference is people will say "actually that's good" when the UK does it, but it's for some reason bad when China does the same exact stuff. According to the UK gov, they're arresting 30 people a day for it. [2] That's nearly 8000 people a year for what they say online. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr548zdmz3jo.amp https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr548zdmz3jo.amp [2] https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807CB70-D90D-4A19-9433-99539B7CF21F/OnlineCommunicationOffenceArrests https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2025-07-17/debates/F807C...
1y ago

mihaaly 1y ago

Usually it is more about the weakness and incapacity of the authorities that are unable to carry out their job well, or several times they are lazy to perform difficult and tedious tasks, so they put limits on everyone instead, making everyone suspect, just to catch those very very few cases, that they are increasingly unable to.

mrkramer 1y ago

I often compare China to the British empire: ruthless autocratic capitalistic dictatorship.