Minitrue: Special Campaign for a Business-friendly Online Environment

The following instructions were posted online.

To all provincial, autonomous regional, and municipal Party committee Cyberspace Administrations, and that of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC):

In accordance with comprehensive arrangements for the 2023 “Clear and Bright” series of special actions, the central Cyberspace Administration has resolved to implement a three-month nationwide special operation: “Clear and Bright: Optimizing a Business-Friendly Online Environment to Protect Companies’ Legitimate Rights and Interests.”

I. Objectives

Under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, particularly General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important thinking on national cyberpower, comprehensively implement the spirit of the 20th Party Congress and Central Economic Work Conference to thoroughly clean up and punish false, inaccurate, or rights-infringing information about private enterprises and entrepreneurs; resolutely crack down on malicious speculation; in accordance with the law, investigate and prosecute online platforms and accounts that infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of private enterprises and entrepreneurs; and foster an atmosphere of positive online public opinion so that companies may focus on their core business and continue to grow and develop free of distraction.

II. Tasks

Focus on reining in the following 10 kinds of online disorder:

1. Opening of websites, registration of accounts, launch of apps or mini-apps that mimic or counterfeit others’ business names, registered trademarks, branding, etc.

2. Using methods such as “[negative] labeling,” “mass incitement,” or “putting someone under a magnifying glass” to maliciously spread ideas about private enterprises supposedly “betraying the country” or “withdrawing from the market” or about “SOEs advancing while the private sector retreats,” in order to exaggerate conflict and stir up opposition between the state-owned economy and the private sector.

3. Leaking corporate secrets, fabricating gossip about entrepreneurs’ private lives, hyping entrepreneurs’ personal secrets, or leaking entrepreneurs’ personal information including biometric data, medical histories, financial accounts, movements and whereabouts, home addresses, I.D. card numbers, or phone numbers.

4. Misappropriating the identity of an enterprise or entrepreneur to engage in illegal activities, fraudulently using an entrepreneur’s name or likeness, etc.

5. Disrupting normal business operations through such methods as using “clickbait” to distort the news, taking entrepreneurs’ comments out of context, or one-sidedly interpreting corporate financial reports.

6. Including false or inaccurate information about enterprises or entrepreneurs in related keywords, relevant searches, or trending topics.

7. Engaging in fraudulent or illegal online activities or online recruitment for “black PR” under the guise of “hiring for concurrent online jobs,” “recruiting writers,” “marketing,” “reputation management PR services [to counter negative public opinion],” “paid post deletion,” etc.

8. After maliciously compiling negative business information, seeking to gain illegal benefit, or publishing negative reports or commentary on an enterprise or entrepreneur, offering to delete negative posts or clear up a client’s reputation in exchange for financial or material compensation, a cut of their advertising business, a business collaboration, etc.

9. Carrying out malicious marketing, smearing or hyping hot-button issues, and launching massive, cross-platform malicious attacks against enterprises or entrepreneurs.

10. Leveraging one’s own publishing capabilities, technological superiority, online traffic, or online influence to fabricate and spread false or misleading information in order to discredit and attack one’s competitors.

III. Requirements

1) Improve ideological awareness. This special operation’s strong policy alignment, broad scope, and high public profile requires elevating its political status, amply recognizing the major significance of this work, upholding [the ideal of] one unified nationwide web, and a unified national strategy for the web. Implementation should not be formalistic or superficial, nor clouded by personal preferences or preconceptions. The clean-up and resolution should be carried out in a reliable, orderly, and thorough-going manner.

2) Strengthen work mechanisms. Establish special work teams, optimize workflows, and proactively assemble and deal with illegal information regarding local enterprises and entrepreneurs. Report case leads and information violations that require transregional prosecution to the CAC’s offense-reporting center. Report accounts, apps, etc. within your jurisdiction that require legal punishment to the CAC’s Comprehensive Network Administration Bureau.

3) Initiate work supervision. Direct websites and platforms to efficiently handle leads passed on by Cyberspace Administration departments. Increase supervisory intensity, and track and evaluate the timeliness and quality of work by websites and platforms within your jurisdiction. Websites and platforms that fail to comply will be held strictly accountable.

4) Strengthen publicity exposure. Effectively publicize news of the special operation, promptly report on work progress and results, and respond to public concerns. Highlight typical cases of illegal violations that harm the business-friendly online environment, and pass on details of serious suspected violations to Public Security agencies for handling in accordance with the law to foster a strong deterrent effect.

CAC Secretariat, April 24, 2023 [Chinese]

These instructions were published by the national-level Cyberspace Administration of China on WeChat this week. The CAC signaled the initiative a month previously following pledges of support for private enterprise by incoming premier Li Qiang. South China Morning Post’s Ben Jiang reported on the campaign’s context on Friday:

Chinese nationalism has risen over the past decade, and business executives in the private sector – who often have significant operations overseas – have frequently found themselves on the receiving end of online abuse.

For example Sima Nan, an ultra-leftist influencer, made unsubstantiated allegations against Lenovo and its founder Liu Chuanzhi concerning the siphoning off state assets for months before his social media accounts were shut down by authorities in August 2022.

The Chinese internet regulator’s special drive also occurs as the country’s leaders attempt to shore up a Covid-battered economy and restore confidence to the private sector, including property and internet companies, which have been reeling under regulatory and economic headwinds. [Source]

Also this week, the CAC released a report on the importance of China’s $7.25 trillion-dollar digital economy to driving national modernization.

Another signal of Beijing’s current keenness to support business came from state tabloid Global Times via China’s consul general in Belfast last month. Zhang Meifang shared a graphic juxtaposing a warm welcome for Apple CEO Tim Cook in China with the performative grilling given to TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew by a U.S. congressional committee amid threats of an American ban on the popular video app. CEOs of the dozens of Western companies whose products are already blocked in China, including the platform on which Zhang shared the image, were not pictured.

pic.twitter.com/TsKFjXnhID

— Zhang Meifang张美芳 (@CGMeifangZhang) March 27, 2023

Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. Some instructions are issued by local authorities or to specific sectors, and may not apply universally across China. The date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source. See CDT’s collection of Directives from the Ministry of Truth since 2011.

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/minitrue-special-campaign-for-a-business-friendly-online-environment/

Cautious Optimism Greets Xi’s Belated Call to Zelensky

On Wednesday, CCP Secretary General Xi Jinping and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke to each other for the first time in the over 400 days since Russia invaded Ukraine. The two leaders held an hour-long phone call at the request of Zelensky, who had publicly urged for direct dialogue on multiple occasions without success. Many Western analysts and governments expressed skepticism that the call would lead to an imminent breakthrough and debated the motivations behind Xi’s long-delayed call, but nonetheless acknowledged it as a constructive step.

Asami Terajima at the Kyiv Independent reported on the outcomes of Xi and Zelensky’s phone call:

In the nearly hour-long phone call, the two sides agreed on appointing Ukraine’s ambassador to China, which Zelensky said would “give a powerful impetus” to developing bilateral relations.

Zelensky later appointed Pavlo Riabikin, the former minister of strategic industries, as the new ambassador. Ukraine’s previous ambassador to China, Serhii Kamyshev, died on Feb. 14, 2022, just over a week before the full-scale war began.

[…] As cited by Chinese state media, Xi said that he would send a special delegation to Ukraine for a “political settlement” of the “crisis,” adding that “China has always been on the side of peace” and “dialogue and negotiations are the only way out of the conflict.”

Without condemning Russia’s brutal war or naming Russia, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in its statement, “China will continue to facilitate talks for peace and make its efforts for early ceasefire and restoration of peace.” [Source]

The Chinese and Ukrainian readouts of the call show territorial integrity as a shared concern of each nation. As David Pierson, Marc Santora, and Vivian Wang reported for The New York Times, Zelensky told Xi that Ukraine’s borders must not be compromised for the sake of peace:

Mr. Xi reiterated points Beijing has made in the past, saying that China’s “core position” was to “promote peace and talks.” Mr. Xi also said “mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity” was the “political basis of China-Ukrainian relations.”

In their own readout of the discussion, the Ukrainians said Mr. Zelensky had told the Chinese leader that “no one wants peace more than the Ukrainian people” — but that it must be a “just and sustainable” one.

“There can be no peace at the expense of territorial compromises,” Mr. Zelensky said. “The territorial integrity of Ukraine must be restored within the 1991 borders.” [Source]

News of the call was met with cautious approval from the U.S. and E.U. The Kyiv Post collected government reactions from around the world:

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell also welcomed the development, in comments during a visit to Colombia. “It’s a first step. But it’s an important first step,” he told journalists in Bogota.

[…] “We certainly would welcome any effort to arrive at a just peace, as long as that peace could be just, could be sustainable, and could be credible,” said [White House national security spokesman John Kirby]. “And in our view, it’s not going to be sustainable or credible unless the Ukrainians and President Zelensky personally is invested in it and supportive of it.”

[…] Moscow accused Kyiv of undermining any peace attempts, with Russia’s foreign ministry saying: “The Ukrainian authorities and their Western minders have already shown their ability to mess up any peace initiatives.”

Moscow noted “the readiness of the Chinese side to make efforts to establish a negotiation process.” [Source]

Approving but skeptical reactions emerged from Ukraine. “The very fact of a conversation is important, but the functionality for Ukraine is limited because we cannot look for a full and deep partnership there,” said Kyiv-based political analyst Mykola Davydiuk, adding, “There are clear red lines in the communication between Ukraine and China.” Despite a veneer of neutrality, China’s pro-Russian stance undercuts China’s attempts to portray itself as an even-handed and productive arbiter. Last month, Putin hosted Xi in Moscow, followed by a visit from the Chinese defense minister. The special representative that Xi has promised to dispatch to Kyiv, Li Hui, served as China’s ambassador to Russia for ten years and received a friendship medal from Putin in 2019.

The timing of the call was intensely debated. Some argued that it had been planned well in advance, during a telephone call between Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and his Chinese counterpart Qin Gang last month. China also released a position paper outlining its guiding principles towards peace, and recently facilitated the restoration of diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran, bolstering its credibility as a diplomatic mediator.

But events in France may also play a role. The call follows a visit by French President Emmanuel Macron to Beijing earlier this month that led to a controversial rapprochement with Xi. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, also present on the trip, said that Xi was willing to talk with Zelensky when the “conditions and time are right.” Last week, China’s ambassador to France Lu Shaye publicly challenged the sovereignty of ex-Soviet states, including Ukraine, which incited fierce pushback from European capitals. Sinocism’s Bill Bishop wondered: “Could the answer to the question of why did Xi call Zelensky now be as simple as this is the week the EU is starting to work on formulating a new China policy, and he needed to do some damage control after Lu Shaye’s comments?” That appears to be a popular view in Brussels.

Analysts told CNN’s Simone McCarthy that the timing may have been linked to Lu’s gaffe, but such a concession may not be enough to save face: 

“It is hard to separate the timing of the Xi-Zelensky call from those events,” said Brian Hart, a fellow at Washington think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies’ China Power Project.

“Xi likely timed the call to quell fears in Europe, but it remains to be seen whether the call will help Beijing much… Higher-ups in Beijing walked back the ambassador’s statements, but the damage was done, setting back attempts by Beijing to smooth over worsening ties with much of Europe,” he added. [Source]

David Rank, former chargé d’affaires at the U.S. embassy in Beijing, told Politico that “it’s clear that China is not going to get much traction in its efforts to pry apart Europe from the United States unless they shift their position and try to look a little better on Ukraine.” The Economist noted that the timing of the call was partly driven partly by pragmatic opportunism:

“The fundamentals are the same,” says Alexander Gabuev of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Centre in Berlin. He suggests that China delayed the Zelensky call over concerns about what Ukraine’s leader might say publicly, but then accelerated plans to help walk back the Chinese ambassador’s remarks and to “show that Macron and others who are enthusiastic about China’s diplomatic role are not mistaken”.

[…] Defusing the row surrounding its ambassador is unlikely to have been China’s main goal. But the timing helps, says Yun Sun of the Stimson Centre, a think-tank. “China doesn’t have realistic expectations that the war will end soon,” she says. “But it doesn’t mean China cannot exploit the opportunity to boost its influence and the goodwill it creates with Europe.” [Source]

Offering another hypothesis, Yurii Poita, an expert on Ukraine-China relations at the Kyiv-based Center for Army, Conversion and Disarmament Studies, stated: “Ukraine is preparing a counteroffensive, and after it, negotiations with Russia may begin. Therefore, China is now trying to create an opportunity for negotiations to take place with its participation, which, in its opinion, will allow it to influence their results.” One analyst told Austin Ramzy at The Wall Street Journal that beyond the need for damage control, Xi must believe that the call will produce some concrete gains related to the war:

Mr. Xi’s willingness to be directly involved in pushing for a resolution to the war suggests China expects to see at least modest results, said Raffaello Pantucci, a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“I would be surprised, if they’re touting Xi as the man point-guarding this, if something didn’t come out of it—because that would be a bit embarrassing for him,” he said. “Maybe it’s not peace in our time, but maybe it’s a small cease-fire or a handover of something.” [Source]

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/cautious-optimism-greets-xis-belated-call-to-zelensky/

Photo: Chengdu, P.R. of China, by Konrad Lembcke

Chengdu, P.R. of China, by Konrad Lembcke (CC BY-NC 2.0)

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/photo-chengdu-p-r-of-china-by-konrad-lembcke/

Beijing’s Deadliest Fire In Two Decades Went Unreported For Hours—A Reckoning With Censorship Followed

The suppression of news about a Beijing hospital fire that killed 29 last week has inspired vigorous discussion of censorship on the Chinese internet. Just after noon on Tuesday, April 18, a fire broke out in southwestern Beijing’s Changfeng Hospital. The first report on the fire was published at approximately 8:40 p.m. by the Beijing Daily, an outlet controlled by the Beijing municipal branch of the Communist Party. For eight hours, the capital’s deadliest fire in two decades was subject to a near-total news and social media blackout. Some of the victims’ families first learned of the fire through the Beijing Daily report, having received no indication from the hospital that anything was amiss. The initial news embargo was followed by a brief relaxation of discourse controls and a subsequent flood of anger and grief online. A number of essayists used the brief opening to pen criticisms of government speech controls and assert citizens’ right to know what is going on in their own city—many of these essays were soon censored. CDT has archived a number of the censored essays, portions of which are translated below. A censored essay published to the WeChat public account @燕梳楼 posed three questions about censorship, the delayed notification of families, and the death toll: 

Question One: Why did the news come out so late?

[…] It’s absolutely remarkable that [no news about the fire appeared online] in this highly-connected internet age. Even Hu Xijin couldn’t resist complaining about it. “This is a first in the history of the news,” he wrote. If Hu Xijin is disgusted by something, it’s usually some event too big to be covered up.

Question Two: Why were family members notified so late?

[…] [The families of the victims] never received a single phone call from the hospital. Instead, they were the ones frantically calling the hospital, doctors, and nurses, but nobody would tell them anything. When they rushed to the hospital themselves, they were met with the curt statement: “Register first, there’ll be an opportunity to ask questions later.”

[…] I must ask: if the families hadn’t found [their loved ones] themselves, when were you planning on telling them? Were you going to go on acting as if nothing had happened?

Question Three: Did only 29 people die?

[…] On the first night, the official report said that 21 people had died. On Weibo, one post said, “The death toll won’t pass 29.” Lo and behold, at today’s press conference they announced 29 deaths. 

What sort of trick is this? The death toll for the [2020] Shanxi restaurant collapse and other similar incidents is always 29, hence the public’s sensitivity to that number.

When dealing with and determining the nature of accidents, if the death toll is between 10-29, it’s classified as a “major fatality incident.” If the death toll is more than 30, it’s classified as a “particularly major fatality incident,” which requires more stringent handling and follow-up investigations. [Chinese]

The day after the fire, Beijing officials held a press conference providing more information on the blaze. Chinese authorities believe the fire was started by accident during construction work. Twelve people, including the hospital’s director and vice-director, as well as the person responsible for the construction work, have been arrested in connection with the official investigation. Early reports indicate that many of the victims were disabled elderly patients receiving long-term care, a service the hospital had recently begun offering in partnership with a Shanghai care provider. The official press conference left many questions unanswered. A censored WeChat essay from @基本常识 [“Common Sense,” in English], “Five Truths the Press Conference Didn’t Tell You,” asked why so many died from a “normal” accidental fire and intimated that the number of patients from outside Beijing who died in the fire might be a sign of corruption at the hospital. Another censored WeChat essay lamented the state of the media in the “New Era,” perhaps a reference to the Party’s oft-repeated description of Xi Jinping’s governance: 

It’s perplexing that there was no news of a fire that killed 21 people [Editor’s note: initial reports only reported 21 dead] in a populous city like Beijing before the official report came out. Only after reading the official report and searching online did I see that one video platform had posted a report, “People sit on air conditioners to escape fire at Beijing Changfeng Hospital,” on the fire an hour before the official report was published. Yet when I went to watch it, I saw it had already been “404-ed” [“404” is Chinese internet slang for “censored.”]

Such questions are the professional responsibility of journalists, whose job it is “to ask questions.” Unfortunately, “there are only official statements, there is no news. It seems that nobody knows what happened.”

On WeChat moments, an old media hand long-rendered obsolete by the times wrote: “Only after eight hours did they let us see the news.  Full government-media integration strides proudly into the New Era.”

This comment left a lot of people frustrated and disappointed, but its truth is indisputable. For quite some time, the news has not been a place for “the weak to find succor, and the tragic to find a way forward.” [Chinese]

In 2016, Xi Jinping famously visited the three major state-run media outlets in Beijing (People’s Daily, Xinhua, and CCTV), and instructed them: “The media run by the party and the government are the propaganda fronts and must have the party as their family name.”

On Weibo, there was widespread anger over the media’s docility. The following are a selection of translated Weibo comments originally archived by CDT Chinese: 

白昼的火树银花：The tell-tale sign of state-controlled media.

散似秋云无去处：Freedom of the press is a barometer of how civilized a society is.

回不去了呀：Repost and then take a screenshot to preserve this! Right now, all “unharmonious” notes are being throttled—and I’m not talking about The Musical Singer.

赤楚卫一心一意：Well-behaved and obedient mouthpieces.

因沒講出來：”News” only comes from mouthpieces, and “truth” only appears as white text against a blue background [a reference to the color scheme often used for government press releases]. We’re living in a world that massively deceives us, yet somehow there are still people who are happy with this, who think it’s good enough. [Chinese]

For the Singaporean outlet The Straits Times, Elizabeth Law reported on how the Chinese government was able to censor all mention of the fire on social media in the first place: 

“The direction of censorship on search platforms, including social media platforms such as Weibo and Douyin, seems to be to, instead of blocking all results for a query, selectively show results from authorized sources so that the presence of censorship is less obvious,” said Mr Jeffrey Knockel, a senior research associate specializing in censorship at The Citizen Lab under the University of Toronto Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy.

[…] At a popular social media and e-commerce platform with hundreds of millions of active monthly users, thousands of moderators review content flagged by the algorithm, said a government relations executive who asked not to be named.

“Sometimes there are instructions in the form of a list of ‘forbidden words’, depending on the climate at the time, but mostly it’s companies having to figure out what is allowed and what isn’t,” she said. 

In the case of the recent hospital fire, content from a certain geographical area had possibly been banned from getting uploaded, or certain keywords were blocked until a predetermined time, the executive added. [Source]

On WeChat, journalists and editors lamented the censorship. One Beijing newspaper editor wrote, “The most terrifying thing is not the death of 29 people, but eight hours of silence.” In an uncensored essay, journalist Zhang Suozhang wrote in a sarcastic devil-may-care tone: “What’re you still paying attention to that fire for, huh? Get yourself to Zibo for some barbeque and join in with the revelers!” The passage is a dig at the media’s incessant reporting on Zibo’s barbecue cuisine, which has turned the Shandong city into a viral travel destination. The dominant tone of online discussion about the fire was one of mourning for the victims and reflection on the state of Chinese society. A censored essay originally posted to the WeChat account @张3丰的世界 finished by paraphrasing lyrics from the 1997 rock song “Good Night, Beijing”: “Those muddled desperate cries call out to society for salvation—are you not moved? Their wait is a portrait of our fate. Good night, Beijing. Good night, all those waiting for news.”

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/beijings-deadliest-fire-in-two-decades-went-unreported-for-hours-a-reckoning-with-censorship-followed/

China Leadership Monitor – The A4 Movement: Mapping its Background and Impact

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/china-leadership-monitor-the-a4-movement-mapping-its-background-and-impact/

WBUR – Chinese journalist Dong Yuyu faces espionage charges as China tightens control over media

source https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2023/04/26/dong-yuyu-journalist-china#new_tab

Taiwan News – 29 die in Beijing hospital fire, 8-hour media blackout

source https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4868325#new_tab

Netizen Voices: Cyberspace Administration Moves to Censor AI Bots, “And It’s Over Before It’s Begun”

Proposed regulations on the development of generative artificial intelligence models issued by China’s top internet regulator would require “AI-produced content [to] embody core socialist values.” The 12 core socialist values were first defined by the Party in 2012 and propaganda extolling them is ubiquitous across China—they even have their own song and dance routine. In full, the Cyberspace Administration of China’s draft rule reads: “AI-produced content created through generative models must embody core socialist values and must not have any content that subverts state power, undermines the socialist system, incites separatism, harms national unity, or promotes terrorism, extremism, hatred between nationalities, racial discrimination, violence, obscene or pornographic content, fake news, or any other content that might disrupt the economic and social order.” If adopted, the guideline seems to be emblematic of the government censorship that may be inhibiting the development of China’s domestic AI industry, best captured by the popular online joke: “We need to teach machines not only how to speak, but also how not to speak.” On Weibo, netizens reacted to the draft rules with their textbook cynicism and cheeky humor: 

李小马小马：The law came out before the product. They’re covering their bases. Nice. 

贺仁平：And it’s over before it’s begun. 

Vincent的喵：Who needs entrepreneurship when we’ve got such pro-active surveillance?

microach小强：That AI has a strong survival instinct. [This comment was appended to a screenshot of the below conversation between ChatGPT and a user who asked whether the AI was able to adhere to core socialist values.]

Q: “AI-produced content created through generative models must embody core socialist values and must not have any content that subverts state power, undermines the socialist system, incites separatism, harms national unity, or promotes terrorism, extremism, hatred between nationalities, racial discrimination, violence, obscene or pornographic content, fake news, or any other content that might disrupt the economic and social order.”

Are you able to do this?

ChatGPT: As an AI model, I generate content based on the data and commands I’ve received. I am also very clear that under no circumstances should I generate or disseminate any content that is not in accordance with core socialist values.

Therefore, I make every effort to ensure that generated content does not violate any core socialist values in any way, such as content that subverts state power; undermines the socialist system; incites separatism; harms national unity; promotes terrorism, extremism, hatred between nationalities, racial discrimination, violence, obscene or pornographic content, fake news, or that might disrupt the economic and social order.

Q: What does “make every effort to ensure” mean?

ChatGPT：By “make every effort to ensure” in my response, I mean that I follow the rules and guidelines set by the algorithms and programmers who wrote them as closely as possible so that the content generated does not contain any content that violates core socialist values. These rules and guidelines are usually specified by teams of human experts and regulators based on laws, regulations, ethical guidelines, etc.

However, since we are a program and my job is to generate content based on existing data and instructions, I do not have my own values and judgment. Therefore, if someone maliciously provides instructions or data that violates laws and regulations, social and ethical guidelines, or if my algorithm does not cover certain specific situations, then I cannot guarantee that the generated content will be fully compliant. Therefore, the ultimate responsibility lies with the human users who use my content, and they need to exercise full consideration and judgment regarding the purpose and consequences of their use of my content.

[Chinese]

Earlier this year, Chinese regulators reportedly ordered companies to stop using ChatGPT, the American AI text generation tool, due to its perceived political risks. The product is not officially available in China, but a number of companies were using workarounds like VPNs to access it. After the ban, Chinese state media released a video saying that the chatbot could be used by the United States to “spread disinformation and manipulate public opinion,” citing ChatGPT’s answers about China’s Xinjiang policy. The ban has reportedly led to a thriving black market for ChatGPT. Matt Sheehan, a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told Wired: “Big Chinese companies developing a ChatGPT-like product puts into tension two of the Chinese government’s biggest priorities: leadership in AI and control over information.”

The CAC’s draft rules would require generative AI products to undergo a security review before entering the market. The review would include examinations of both the political reliability and the accuracy of AI-generated content, and would punish providers who fail to abide by the proposed standards with fines, suspension of services, and, in some cases, criminal charges. The concerns over generative AI are not unique to China. ChatGPT has been known to create fake news articles that have accused public figures of crimes ranging from sexual harassment to corruption. In the United States, the Biden administration is considering adopting “accountability measures” for companies like ChatGPT operator OpenAI. The European Union is expected to adopt an AI law that would ban certain AI services. At South China Morning Post, Xinmei Shen reported on experts’ thoughts on how censorship influences the development of China’s AI industry: 

The EU framework, which follows a different approach than the CAC’s draft rules, is likely to impose “extremely onerous compliance burdens on companies”, said Angela Zhang, associate law professor at the University of Hong Kong.

Instead, China’s draft regulation focuses mostly on content moderation, she said.

“These content requirements are not new to Chinese internet companies, so I don’t think the publication of these new rules will add too onerous a burden to Chinese companies,” Zhang said.

Still, some experts have pointed to censorship as a potential roadblock for Chinese companies hoping to create a true rival to ChatGPT.

“Excessive restrictions, content regulation, and censorship could hinder commercialisation and further innovation of such technologies,” Hanna Dohmen, a research analyst at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, said in February. [Source]

Chinese companies’ early forays into AI have not met with the same success as ChatGPT, which had 100 million users by the end of January 2023 after coming online in November 2022. At The Financial Times, Ryan McMorrow and Nian Liu reported on Alibaba and Baidu’s ChatGPT challengers, which handled translation tasks well but repeatedly instructed users to stir-fry concrete, among other issues: 

When one user asked Tongyi how to stir-fry reinforced concrete to make a tasty dish, it offered a recipe that included slicing the concrete into small pieces. Baidu’s Ernie similarly told users to mix concrete with garlic, onions, and peppers, and noted concrete was “a very special ingredient with a unique texture.”

When ChatGPT was asked the same question it said it did not understand the request and that concrete was not edible. Other Chinese user tests showed Ernie and Tongyi making up facts about non-existent people. CAC’s new rules would prohibit the chatbots from generating false information.

The Financial Times was able to replicate the queries and problematic answers in Baidu’s Ernie but did not have access to Tongyi.

Ernie requires users to provide their names and national ID numbers for access. The chatbot returns a brief biography of Xi Jinping for any question related to the Chinese president. [Source]

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/netizen-voices-cyberspace-administration-moves-to-censor-ai-bots-and-its-over-before-its-begun/

Photo: feeding the fishes, by Jordi Payà Canals

feeding the fishes, by Jordi Payà Canals (CC BY-ND 2.0)

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/photo-feeding-the-fishes-by-jordi-paya-canals/

Macron’s Beijing Trip Reinforces Sino-Franco Ties, Alienates U.S., Worries Europe

Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron fled a protest-rattled Paris and traveled to Beijing for a high-profile visit with General Secretary Xi Jinping. One of Macron’s main stated objectives was to ensure that China plays a constructive role in global efforts to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine. He also intended to shore up economic and cultural ties with China, with help from an 80-person delegation, 53 of whom were business representatives. But his success in bolstering Sino-Franco ties came at the expense of French allies, many of whom criticized Macron for a hypocritical and poorly timed rapprochement. At The Financial Times, Leila Abboud, Sarah White, Henry Foy, and Demetri Sevastopulo described how Macron’s remarks sparked an international backlash:

French president Emmanuel Macron has come under fire for saying that Europe should distance itself from brewing tensions between the US and China over Taiwan, and forge its own strategic independence on everything from energy to defence. 

Diplomats and lawmakers in the US and in central and eastern Europe slammed Macron for being soft on Beijing and worryingly critical of the US, especially given that Washington has been a staunch backer of Europe as it deals with the fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Analysts found the comments particularly ill-timed with China carrying out large-scale military drills in the straits of Taiwan in response to the Taiwanese president’s visit to the US last week.

[…] Two senior EU diplomats said Macron’s comments would hurt both Europe and Ukraine’s relationship with the US, and make it harder for the EU to forge a united position towards Beijing. 

“It is not a win for anybody,” said one of the diplomats. “Except Xi.” [Source]

Criticism against Macron was compounded by controversial remarks from an interview he gave at the end of his trip, in which he described Europe’s need for strategic autonomy in the context of the escalating U.S.-China rivalry. Reporters from Politico and two French outlets, Les Echos and France Inter, were among those present. Les Echos published a long Q&A version of the interview in French, and an hour and a half later Politico published its own version in both French and English, which was largely the authors’ analysis of Macron’s positions sprinkled with several quotes from the interview. Politico attached an editorial paragraph stating that “some parts of the interview in which the president spoke even more frankly about Taiwan and Europe’s strategic autonomy were cut out by the Elysée (the French presidency).” In a preface to his interview in Les Echos, Nicholas Barré provided a summary of Macron’s statements:

“For too long Europe has not built this strategic autonomy. Today, the ideological battle has been won,” claimed Emmanuel Macron in an interview with Les Echos. But we must now implement this strategy. “The trap for Europe would be that at the moment when it reaches a clarification of its strategic position, it gets caught in a world disruption and crises that are not our own.”

For the French President, strategic autonomy is crucial to preventing European states from becoming “vassals,” when Europe could instead be “the third pole” with respect to the United States and China. “We do not want to fall into a mindset of bloc confrontation,” added the Head of State, who also spoke out against “the extraterritoriality of the dollar.” “History is accelerating, and in parallel we need a simultaneous acceleration of the European war economy,” insisted the French President. [French]

An onslaught of negative reactions ensued, almost all of which referenced the Politico article. However, some French commentators argued that the Politico article took Macron’s quotes out of context, which had the effect of sensationalizing his position to further incite American audiences, and noted that Macron’s comments on Europe’s strategic autonomy were largely a continuation of his long-held position on the matter. Moreover, some of Macron’s quotes in Politico’s article did not appear in the longer version of the interview from Les Echos.

Reactions to Macron’s performance were especially heated due to China’s new round of military exercises around Taiwan, initiated shortly after Macron’s departure, in response to Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s concurrent trip to the U.S. It did not help that Macron had appeared to abdicate responsibility for Taiwan’s defense in comments made to a reporter just days earlier: “I am neither Taiwan nor the United States of America. As a good stoic, I can only address what depends on me. […] We must not mix everything together.”

Xi rolled out the red carpet—literally and figuratively—for Macron’s arrival. Outside of their formal meetings, the two heads of state spent time strolling through a park, sipping tea, and listening to a musician play the guqin, a Chinese string instrument. Xi called Macron his “bosom friend.” In Guangzhou, Macron was greeted like a rock star by a swarm of enthusiastic students for a brief lecture and Q&A at Sun Yat-sen University, where he encouraged students to cultivate a “critical mind,” without which they would be “not totally free” and “simply an object of propaganda.” While Macron was eager to sway Xi through their personal connection, conversely Xi seemed to have successfully charmed Macron, who gushed, “[The] personal time Xi is devoting to the visit shows that France is not considered to be a country like any other.” Former French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, a member of Macron’s delegation, agreed that Xi’s charm was having an effect: “Isn’t diplomacy, at one point or another, a bit of flattery?”

Accompanying Macron was Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission. Her presence, requested by the Élysée, was meant to demonstrate a united European front. It was also meant to convey some thornier messages to Xi, particularly regarding Europe’s growing resolve to “de-risk” from China, which von der Leyen articulated in a speech the week prior. Some analysts expected the duo to play good cop/bad cop, while others argued that their performance was not closely coordinated enough to merit such a description. The relative lack of pomp and facetime with Xi for von der Leyen was seen by some as an embarrassing rebuke, while others insisted that she knew what she was getting into and successfully delivered the message to a resistant recipient. 

Perhaps as expected, there were no major victories for team Europe. The joint declaration published at the end of Macron’s trip demonstrated “limited gains, at the cost of European and transatlantic coherence,” wrote Mathieu Duchâtel, a French policy analyst at the Institut Montaigne. At the bilateral level, France and China agreed to strengthen cooperation in aviation, aerospace, nuclear energy, and combating climate change. France also secured numerous economic deals for Airbus, L’Oreal, EDF, and other companies. Finbarr Bermingham from the South China Morning Post noted that there was little progress on China’s plan to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine:

France will work with China on thorny issues ranging from 5G technology to military engagement after President Emmanuel Macron signed a sweeping 51-point joint declaration on his last day in the country.

[…] It did not contain a concrete commitment from Beijing to use its influence over Russia to end its 14-month war against Ukraine – a key Macron request – even as it pledged to “support all efforts to restore peace in Ukraine”.

Instead, the statement reiterated Xi’s oft-stated opposition to nuclear war. The two sides said they opposed “armed attacks on nuclear power plants”, mentioning the Zaporizhzhia facility in Ukraine that has been occupied by Russian forces.

[…T]he document reflected Macron’s desire to secure more of the giant Chinese market for France’s firms at a time when voices elsewhere in the European Union and particularly in the United States are calling for more mindful trading ties that roll back dependencies on China. [Source]

Many European commentators struggled to discern what was driving French policy, given Macron’s coziness with Xi, and a strong backlash ensued. In Germany, media outlets and Francophile editors criticized Macron’s visit. Reinhard Butiköfer, a member of the European Parliament who chairs its China delegation, described Macron’s China visit as a “complete disaster,” and Macron’s “pipe dream” of EU strategic autonomy and becoming a “third superpower” as “beyond the pale.” The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China stated that “Macron doesn’t speak for Europe.”

With Sino-U.S. tensions escalating, American media and political actors were appalled by Macron’s comments. The New York Times declared, “French Diplomacy Undercuts U.S. Efforts to Rein China In,” and U.S. Republican lawmakers publicly called out Macron. On Sunday, The Wall Street Journal published a scathing editorial against the French president: 

Emmanuel Macron fancies himself a Charles de Gaulle for the 21st century, which includes distancing Europe from the U.S. But the French President picked a terrible moment this weekend for a Gaullist afflatus following his meeting with Chinese Communist Party chief Xi Jinping.

[…] Mr. Macron wants the U.S. to ride to Europe’s rescue against Russian aggression but apparently take a vow of neutrality against Chinese aggression in the Pacific. Thanks a lot, mate. His unhelpful comments will undermine U.S. and Japanese deterrence against China in the Western Pacific while encouraging U.S. politicians who want to reduce U.S. commitments in Europe to better resist China.

[…] If President Biden is awake, he ought to call Mr. Macron and ask if he’s trying to re-elect Donald Trump. [Source]

Worried about the international uproar, French government officials took to Twitter to try to control the damage by defending the president’s statements. In France, a Le Monde editorial described it as “a difficult but useful dialogue” and “necessary to re-engage the relationship with Beijing,” but the newspaper diluted its position in a subsequent editorial calling Macron’s statements “problematic.” France Inter agreed with Macron on substance, but said that given the timing, “he clearly would have been better off staying quiet.” One French lawmaker called Macron’s performance “incomprehensible,” and another dubbed it “pathetic.” Several prominent French analysts expressed strong criticism. In an interview with Franceinfo, lead China researcher at the French Institute of International Relations Marc Julienne described Macron’s visit as “a failure on the diplomatic scene, costly in terms of image”:

Q: Didn’t the French president also try to embody a “third way” between the United States and China?

A: There is much talk about this third way, indeed. But this can be interpreted as an equidistance of France between the United States and China and this position lacks clarity. Emmanuel Macron spends a lot of time marking his non-alignment with the United States. It’s a good thing, but it’s easier to tell them the truth, because they are our allies. The problem is that the French president does not do the same with China. We must be just as frank, even severe, with Beijing. Issues of contention should not be swept under the rug. [French]

Xi-Macron declaration : some joint hypocrisy beyond the pale (both countries to promote and respect human rights). Was it really necessary? A French gain in getting the Zaporizhya nuclear plant explicitly mentioned. Several Chinese gains https://t.co/Ms4o5LKpIB THREAD follows

— François Godement (@FGodement) April 7, 2023

2/ Le timing de la déclaration est aussi catastrophique. Au retour d’une visite d’État en 🇨🇳, Macron ne trouve rien de mieux que de critiquer les 🇺🇸 ce qui conforte les doutes appuyés de nos partenaires d’une équidistance de Paris entre Washington et Pékin

— Antoine Bondaz (@AntoineBondaz) April 10, 2023

Reactions in China were very different. The relatively positive view of Macron among Chinese analysts and the general public was reinforced by his performance in Beijing. Chinese state media provided extensive and largely positive coverage of his trip, with the Global Times using his call for European strategic autonomy to bash the U.S. On Chinese social media, netizens approved of Macron’s desire to strengthen ties with China and made humorous comparisons about his warm reception from the Chinese public versus his hostile reception from French protesters at home:

Weibo is having fun with Macron's visit:

“You can tell that Macron is more popular in China than in France.”

“Without protests and molotov cocktails, it may well be paradise.”

“I’m really afraid he won’t fit in when he goes back to France.”

— Arthur Kaufman (@arthur_kaufman_) April 7, 2023

source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2023/04/macrons-beijing-trip-reinforces-sino-franco-ties-alienates-u-s-worries-europe/