Information/Technology - 47. page

On January 9, 2019, China Netcasting Services Association (CNSA), a government-led industrial association, issued regulations to cover online short video platforms.

According to The Paper, a mainland news portal, the regulations require the platforms to be proactive in introducing mainstream news media and institutions such as the communist party, the government, and military organizations. The purpose is to open accounts to “improve the supply of positive and quality short video contents.” The content layout is required to focus on promoting the “core values of socialism.”

It also requires that the short video platforms establish a system of editorial responsibility for the contents. All short video and audio broadcasts on the platforms “should be reviewed before broadcasting, including the title of the program, the introductory section, bullet screens, and comments.”

According to the regulation, the platform should “establish a team of auditors with high political quality and professional competence.” The provincial or higher level radio and television administrative authorities should train the auditors and the number of auditors should match the number of short video programs uploaded and streamed. In principle, the number of auditors should be more than one-thousandth of the daily number of new short video and audio broadcasts on the platforms.

Source: Central News Agency, January 9, 2019
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/acn/201901090316.aspx

The smart school uniform that Guizhou Guanyu Technology (贵州冠宇科技) developed was first launched in July 2017. According to its official website (http://www.guanyukj.com), ten elementary and middle schools have been using the smart school uniforms from the company. The schools are located in Guizhou, Fujian, Guangxi, and other provinces in China.

According to a Chinese media report, when the smart school uniform is put on, the school’s large screen monitor will automatically identify the student, display the student’s avatar, and record the accurate time of entering and exiting the school. The parents and teachers receive detailed information about the student’s activities. As soon as the student leaves the school, there is a voice broadcast to identify the student.

The smart school uniform, in combination with human facial recognition and fingerprint recognition technologies, will automatically calculate and settle a student’s different expenditures at school. The parents will know every item of their child’s expenditures in school.

This product is said to integrate big data, digitization of the Internet of Things (IoT), satellite technology, such as RFID, NFC, Beidou (the Chinese counterpart of GPS system), GPS, RS, and clothing.

The smart school uniform also comes with an app. In the app, the teacher can approve the student’s leave request and upload school notices and the time-stamped video of the students entering and leaving the school. Parent teachers can receive such information through the mobile app. Teachers can use the app to hand out course materials through voice, text, and pictures. The chip-embedded school uniform, with facial and fingerprint recognition, has established a closed-loop AI environment for the school. The students’ every move is in the hands of teachers and parents.

Qinjia (钦家), a Shanghai based company, also developed a smart school uniform, with the main function of preventing children from getting lost or being trafficked. Another company Seeworld launched another school uniform, mainly used when a student encounters an accident. The student can tap a specific part of the uniform to send out an S.O.S. signal.

In December 2015, the Beijing Municipal Education Commission set up a “Beijing Elementary and Middle School Uniform R&D Center” at the Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology. According to the official press release, the smart school uniforms will combine the motion sensor with the school uniform to track and analyze the student’s physical activity, analyze and compare the student’s physical functions and exercise volume, and ensure that the underage students receive proper physical exercises.

The People’s Daily also reported that a middle school in Hangzhou introduced an intelligent classroom behavior management system, which can monitor the students’ classroom behavior at a glance. The system can also analyze the students’ classroom behavior and the expressions during class and can also check attendance through facial recognition.

The smart school uniforms and similar technologies have received a lot of attention on cyberspace.

One netizen said, “Children have no human rights; they are just the possessions of their parents.”

Another put it this way, “A child is not a parent’s possession and the parents cannot completely control him. There is no longer any privacy.”

Source: Sina.com, December 24, 2018
https://t.cj.sina.com.cn/articles/view/6502104867/1838e3f2300100ywix

In 2018, China has continued to enhance its social credit score system. The authorities have released 32 Memorandums of Cooperation (MoCs) on disciplinary actions in fields that include social security, intellectual property, research, medical care, and marriage registrations.

Restrictions on plane and train travel appear in almost every MoC. For example, the Memorandum of Cooperation on Joint Disciplinary Actions against Seriously Untrustworthy Enterprises and Personnel in Social Security, jointly issued by 28 authorities, lists 32 types of penalties for nine cases of violations, including refusal to pay social security fees, failure to report social security income truthfully, and social security fraud. Among the disciplinary actions are restrictions on air travel, sleeping carriages with cushioned berths on trains, on second-class on ships, on all seats on the G-series multiple unit (MU) trains (high-speed rail), and on first-class seats on other MU’s.

Beginning in June 2018, on the first working day of each month, the “Credit China” website (http://www.creditchina.gov.cn/) will announce a list of people who are restricted from trains and planes. As more MoC’s have been issued, the number of people restricted from travel by air or by train has been increasing every month. As of September 2018, the cumulative occurrence of restrictions on air ticket purchases has been 14.78 million; on high-speed rail tickets it has been 5.24 million.

Another punishment for being “untrustworthy” is the denial of the qualification for working as a civil servant. In some recently issued joint MoC’s, some new disciplinary measures have begun to appear, such as not being able to buy a house and a restriction on tourist travels. People who owe taxes of more than 100,000 yuan (US$ 14,500) are also blacklisted and subject to restrictions such as no bring allowed to leave the country.

Source: China News Service, December 8, 2018
http://www.chinanews.com/cj/2018/12-08/8695727.shtml

Xinhua published an article on the new energy vehicle industry in China. It reported that, in recent years, the industry has experienced rapid growth. However, the industry is facing some challenges that are also emerging. These include dependence on subsidies, overcapacity, and a lack of ownership of core technologies. According to the article, over the last five years, China has had an annual compound growth rate for new energy vehicle sales of 130 percent, mostly due to financial assistance from the government, which has provided rebates to consumers and subsidies to the manufacturers. Meanwhile, an increased number of public charging stations in residential complexes, work units, and along the highways has boosted the support for electric vehicles. In 2017, the investment in the new energy vehicles industry exceeded 700 billion yuan (US$100 billion), accounting for more than 50 percent of the total investment in the entire automotive industry. However, the new energy vehicle industry also faces challenges. First, the industry is flooded with companies that want to take advantage of the government subsidy program, especially engine battery manufacturers, which has resulted in excess capacity. Also, over a dozen companies have been charged with filing false claims to cheat the subsidy system. Second, the companies lack the drive to develop new technology and to market the vehicles as many of them tend simply to rely on the government subsidies just to break even. According to the 2018 Global Electric Vehicle Development Index, China ranks first overall, but this is mainly reflected in the market scale. On the technical level, China’s vehicle manufacturing is still positioned in the low-tech field. It still relies on imports of basic components such as electric drive high-speed bearings and control chips. Third there is an increased risk in environmental hazard control. The potential environmental waste from used batteries could be a big risk. It is estimated that by 2020, China will have 120,000 to 170,000 tons of electric batteries to be scrapped. Lastly, domestic manufacturers are facing competition as foreign auto manufacturers such as Volkswagen, Honda, Tesla, BMW, Audi, and Jaguar have increased their investment and presence in the new energy vehicle market in China.

Source: Xinhua, November 29, 2018
http://www.xinhuanet.com/energy/2018-11/29/c_1123782958.htm

On November 27, LinkSure Network, a Shanghai-based mobile Internet service provider, announced in Beijing that it launched the satellite Internet access plan, “LinkSure Swarm Constellation System.” The system, which LinkSure will develop independently, consists of 272 hybrid orbit satellites and will provide satellite communication services and solutions. The first satellite is expected to be launched into space in 2019. The goal will be to provide free satellite Internet service worldwide by 2026. The total investment in the system is estimated at 3 billion yuan (US$ .43 billion).

LinkSure’s satellite team was formally established in 2016. The company currently operates more than 50 satellites in orbit. According to the plan, the first satellite will be assembled and tested in Changzhou, Jiangsu in 2018 and launched by the Long March series of rockets at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Base Center in 2019. The first batch is expected to include 10 satellites. After the launch of the first satellite, the remaining nine will be launched according to the Long March series rocket launch arrangements. In 2020, the first 10 satellite launches of the constellation system will be completed.

China’s commercial satellite launch service market has been growing at an accelerated pace. In 2014, the State Council announced Document No. 60 to encourage private capital to enter the national civil space infrastructure. Goldman Sachs also expects that, over the next 20 years, the space commercial market will usher in a long-term and high-profit opportunity and its industry scale will grow to trillions of dollars.

Source: The Paper, November 27, 2018
https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_2676730

Beijing News recently reported that the Chinese cloud technology company Guizhou Cloud has completed a series of mergers and become Guizhou Cloud Big Data. In February, Apple officially handed its iCloud services to Guizhou Cloud and Guizhou Cloud is now fully serving all Chinese region Apple iCloud customers. This arrangement was to comply with Chinese data location laws and allowed Guizhou Cloud to have the master encryption key to decrypt all Chinese region traffic and data. The recent ownership changes made China’s Guizhou Province government the biggest stockholder (around 38.24 percent) of the newly formed company Guizhou Cloud Big Data. This is a “strategic move” of the Guizhou government’s big data industrial development plan. The Guizhou Communist Party appointed Kang Keyan as the Party Secretory of the Guizhou Cloud Big Data Group and, at the same time, nominated him as the chairman of the board of the Group. Kang is the former Deputy Director of the Guizhou Big Data Development Authority.

Source: Beijing News, November 16, 2018
http://www.bjnews.com.cn/finance/2018/11/16/522023.html